


SuperNova

by princess_astra



Series: SuperNova Series [1]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: And everyone else - Freeform, Cross-Posted on Wattpad, Eleventh Doctor Era, F/M, I KNOW YALL HATE DYLAN BUT HES MY BABY OKAY, Minor Original Character(s), Original Character(s), Original Character-centric, Originally Posted on FanFiction.Net, POV Original Character, POV Original Female Character, and meredith :'), meredith is the only white oc I've ever made lmfao, nova is also moody but mostly because she needs everything to be logical, the doctor is really moody, the main character is a latina, this took me 2 whole years to write can u believe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-15
Updated: 2017-06-16
Packaged: 2018-03-23 00:51:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 40
Words: 159,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3748954
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/princess_astra/pseuds/princess_astra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>So this, my future, memory-wiped self, is the story of how I found love and lost it. This is the story of how I broke a million rules. This is the story of stars, secrets, and sacrifice.</p><p>  This is the story of how I became.</p><p>   11/OC -- COMPLETED!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Area 51

**Author's Note:**

> Also posted on wattpad with my comments as 'annotations' if you feel like something extra for a re-read. Originally posted to fan fiction.net but i don't recommend going there, it's super gross and un-editied.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> '888' is a scene break. This is the shortest chapter there will ever be.

**'888' is a scene break.**

_"When a star goes supernova, the explosion emits enough light to overshadow an entire solar system, even a galaxy. Such explosions can set off the creation of new stars. In its own way, it was not unlike being born." – Todd Nelson_

I woke up on the damp, yet crumbly floor with only one thought in my mind: kill.

I jolted up immediately at the word that seemed to be endlessly repeating itself in my conscience. I didn't know why it was there, and actually, now that I thought about it... I didn't know much of anything. All I knew was that half of me was determined to kill, and the other half of me really didn't want to. One hundred percent of me, though, was confused and hungry.

I stood up from the rusty-red soil and dusted myself off, noticing that I was in a small area in a red cavern. I gulped as I spun all the way around, not seeing a way out, only a metallic black arch in front of me that seemed extremely modern and out of place within the small rock walls. I felt sweaty now, not only from the moisture building up in the room, but I felt a heat that was unexplainable— like I had just walked through fire. Only then did I notice I had a paper in my hand.

I stared down at it a moment, puzzled. How did I miss it before? I opened the worn yellow parchment slowly and read its contents.

_Sometimes in life, the choices you have to make aren't as simple as good and bad. Sometimes, you have a bad choice, and another bad choice, and it's up to you to decide which one is less bad._

_Once upon a time, I made one of these choices. I broke a law or two... or 26_.

_You see, I did do these things, but I don't completely remember it. Everyone else does. Everywhere I go around here, people look at me like I've either performed a miracle, or created chaos. Now I've done it again, and this time, I refuse to forget a single moment._

_I hope that my future self is reading this, because I have to remember. There are a million fates depending on it, including mine. Yours. Ours. All you have to do is walk through the archway front of you. I can't explain how it works here, but it will tell you everything._

_So this, my future, memory-wiped self, is the story of how I found love and lost it. This is the story of how I broke a million rules. This is the story of stars, secrets, and sacrifice._

_This is the story of how I became._

I folded it again and stared at the arch in front of me, and back to the paper. I stood back a moment, and walked all around the arch, but there was nothing else but black metal. I stepped through.

**888**

1000 years earlier/later, 2015

There were two things in life I was certain I knew everything about.

The first was Doctor Who. I had started watching it with my best friend Deevia in high school, and ever since my life completely turned around, I still watched it into my early adult years because it was the only piece of myself I felt I had left from my normal life.

The second was Area 51—the thing that completely turned my life around at the age of 19. Area 51 was in fact a center to test and experiment on alien objects. However, while we were government employees, it was technically a family business. Now I'm 25, and over the years so far I've seen enough to believe that anything is possible, and that's not always a good thing. Maybe I've lost hope in other worlds, but I've learned so much working here, so much about how the little things of the world work. I've come to truly love every science there is, and gained a sense of wonder I was sure I would never let go of.

I opened my small, ornate treasure chest my aunt gave me. Inside was my good luck charm, and today I was going to need it.

I took the rose gold necklace out of the chest and put it on. It's a locket, but it won't open. On one side is a jewel, and on the other are some circular engravings. How the necklace looks or works doesn't matter to me, though. What matters to me is that my aunt gave it to me as a good luck charm, and it's never failed me before.

When I got to work, everyone was talking quietly, yet today they seemed more enthusiastic. People in lab coats and business suits were scattered throughout the large, concrete observatory. I smiled at the scene of grown-up nerds, as I liked to call us. Today we would be doing our first tests on an artifact I discovered, which was a small yellow orb that looked like it was filled with Christmas Lights.

I couldn't help but be excited. Ever since I first got here, only three people have given me any respect for the work I've done: my best friend Meredith, my other best friend Dylan, and my mentor, Professor Zodiac. These three people aside from my father, of course. Maybe now that I went out and discovered the artifact on my own instead of having my mission partner Dylan retrieve it, I could get some credit.

"I knew it was you!"

I turned around to see Dylan walking up to me. "A great, shiny, artsy-looking orb. Who else would have found it?" He said, casually putting his arm around my shoulders.

I laughed a little. "Yeah. I mean, I love science− but I think I've always been an artist, too."

"Do you think you would have been an artist?"

I never liked to think about what would have happened if Area 51 wasn't in my blood, or if I wasn't forced to work here. There isn't really anything I can do about it. What's the point in thinking about the what-ifs if they're never going to happen? Thinking about what could have been is dangerous, but I did anyway.

"Not really. I definitely would have done a lot more in my free time, but I think I would still love science. So I'm okay." I didn't dare say what else I was thinking.

 _I have to be here, so I might as well learn to be okay_.

He stared at me for a moment. Both of us knew there were people who would kill to get in here, and kill to get out. Then there are the ones who are just _okay_.

"It's a blessing and a curse, isn't it?" He sighed. I gave a weak smile and looked down to the floor. He sighed and shuffled his feet through the awkward silence. "Well, congratulations." he smiled, walking away.

Right when he left, my best friend Meredith wiggled her eyebrows at me. I say best friend, even though she's nine years older than me. Dylan is the second youngest at age 28. None of us are allowed to date outside of Area 51 for the sake of maintaining job confidentiality, and although hundreds of us work here, finding real love is still rare. So of course, people are always trying to root for Dylan and I to start a relationship in the most parental and non-awkward way they can manage. He's nice and attractive, with Egyptian tan skin and green eyes, but he's my best friend and coworker, too.

Usually Area 51 kids don't _know_ that they're Area 51 kids until the age of 22, when the government comes knocking on their door. The only reason I got here early, is because I found out too soon.

"Such a clever girl," Professor Zodiac, my mentor, said to me in his thick Indian accent that never lost its shine, putting his hand on my shoulder and smiling at me. He was the last person to ever be accepted into Area 51 from the outside, along with his brother. We called them Recruits: which might sound like a small title, but getting into this business without any personal connection means you must really have brains. To have him respect me meant a great deal. "It's time."

Everyone stood back or went to their station, but I just stepped forward, staring at the orb in awe. I couldn't help but wish my dad were here.

Last I checked, was off somewhere looking for an artifact in Rome. He's in charge of looking for artifacts and other alien objects like Dylan is— the Retrievers. Our bosses are alerted about a mysterious object anywhere in the world, and it's their job to retrieve it and bring it back to headquarters here. Then, people like Meredith and I get to test and observe it until there's nothing left to test. We check to make sure it isn't harmful, but also, to see if it's useful.

I never knew my mom, though, because my dad made the mistake of falling in love with someone outside the department. Still, I know he's proud of me, no matter where he is.

"Clear!" Professor Zodiac yelled, pulling a lever, slowly charging the orb with power. It was risky, but after a few days, we deemed it the best way to get a response out of the object. I was never completely confident in my findings like the other scientists were, so I was a little worried. I held my breath as it surged with thousands of volts, but it didn't seem electrocuted. It seemed to be calmly persisting through a rampant thunderstorm, glowing softly until it was no longer just yellow, but also a burnt red, so that it looked like a fiery sunset.

Suddenly, I felt a burning sensation on my chest and looked down at my necklace. The crystal on it also seemed to be on fire. I held it in my hand and felt warm. It was shining and glowing a brilliant ruby red, but I didn't feel afraid of it. I kept holding it in awe. Something about it made me feel complete, and I didn't realize how long I was mesmerized by it until I heard a voice calling out my name.

"Scarlette!" Dylan yelled, breaking me out of my trance. He was out of breath and flustered. "You have to give us that necklace," he demanded cautiously, arm outstretched, waiting for me to hand it over.

The sensation I felt was so new, all I could manage to do was shake my head. There was no way I was giving them this necklace to lock up in glass and test on, especially now. Something about the warm glow gave me an overwhelming sense of home and belonging that I've never felt before.

"Scarlette Rivera!" The Professor yelled, startling me. I turned to my left to see him running towards me. I looked down at the necklace. I knew that in seconds someone would pry it from my hands, so I squeezed it tight.

Only I wasn't only squeezing it, I was pressing a button.

Before I could do anything, the world around me already seemed to be falling apart. It looked like my surroundings were becoming pixelated, a picture being cut up, and I couldn't tell what was real. In a panic, I began hyperventilating. It felt like hours. I was caught in a whirlwind and was becoming motion sick. I couldn't see a thing, but I knew there was so much happening around me. Colors and lights blinded me, yet I couldn't close my eyes in awe.

Then, it abruptly stopped.

I crouched, feeling like I had landed somewhere. I stared at the grass below me, running my fingers through it in shock. I definitely wasn't in Area 51 anymore, but I wasn't alone.

I looked up to see none other than Karen Gillan in front of me, staring at me with wide eyes. I was right by a parking lot, and I had the fear that the redhead in front of me might be the only thing I knew around here.

Tears were staining my cheeks as I stood. "Karen?" I croaked, breathing rapidly.

Karen dropped the grocery bag she was carrying. "Who's Karen? Oh my god, you weren't lying," She put her hands to her head in frustration before walking closer to me. "Can I just ask, why now? Or no, how about we just start at _why_?"

I wiped my tears and tried to focus, looking around frantically to try to take in more of my environment. I had to get it together to figure out what in the world was going on. "What are you talking about?"

I reached up to touch the locket on my chest and felt the heat from it die down, and hypothesized that the alien artifact I had found did something to it, and then it did something to me.

Karen stepped up to me, and for some reason, cautiously reached out to touch my hair. She grabbed the ends and looked at them closely, frowning, not finding whatever she was looking for. She even squinted, and plucked individual strands, before seeing how I was giving her a strange look and let go. "Scarlette?"

She looked at me expectantly; as if she was worried about what I was going to do next. I nodded at her slowly. "Yes?"

Her wariness quickly turned to anger. "I cannot _believe_ you would do this now!" She rambled, but I still had no idea what she was talking about, or if it was even directed at me. I didn't remember doing anything except pressing a button and showing up here. She picked up her grocery bags and started walking furiously. "Come on."

I looked around at my surroundings, and none of it seemed familiar except for Karen, so I decided to follow her, and nearly had to jog since she was walking so fast. Maybe it wasn't the smartest idea to follow someone I barely knew, but she seemed to know me... even if she didn't seem to like me very much. It didn't look like I was going to get back anytime soon, so I decided to get answers. "What do you mean? Do what now?"

She turned to glare at me, still not walking slower. She opened her mouth as if she were about to say something, before shaking her head and closing it, gripping her grocery bag tightly.

I kept looking around as we continued walking, but it didn't even look like we were in America. I looked back to her and thought of everything we just said to see if I could remember what it was that made her mad, until I remembered the first thing she said to me.

_Who's Karen?_

She didn't know who Karen was... so who is the girl in front of me?

I furrowed my eyebrows and stared at her for a long moment, a million different possibilities running through my mind. None of them made any sense, and I was an extra terrestrial scientist. It was my _job_ to make the nonsensical things understandable, but as she turned to walk into an apartment and I spotted a classic looking red car out front, I realized that it _did_ look familiar.

And then I realized, that there was no way this was happening.

"Amy?" I asked cautiously.

She walked up the steps to the door, and paused to turn back to me. "Yeah?"

I always imagined what it would be like if the Doctor found me, but never did I think of what would happen if I found him.

 


	2. The Eleventh Hour (pt 1)

"No. Way," I whispered. Although when I thought about it, there were actually many plausible theories. I touched the wall as I stepped through the door and pinched myself.

Theory number one: dreaming. False.

When I followed Amy inside, Rory was sitting on a small brown couch. Before Rory had a chance to say anything, with a perplexed look on his face, Amy yelled.

"Rory! Scarlette is here!" She went to sit next to him on the couch and put her head in her hands.

Rory looked shocked at her words. "Really?"

"Yup!" Amy sighed, her head still in her hands.

Rory stood up and walked over to me, looking at me cautiously. I expected him to say something, but just like Amy did before, he only stared intently at my hair, and then glanced to me as if asking for permission to touch it. I didn't understand their obsession with my hair. It wasn't special, or anything. It was a normal light brown color. I forgot to brush it this morning in excitement, so it was kind of messy— yet he was observing a lock of it closely, flipping it in his hands, until I became too uncomfortable with the situation and stepped back.

"Okay, can you maybe tell me what's going on? And _what_ is it with my hair?" I asked frantically, Amy still refusing to look at me, glaring at the television in front of her.

"Everything's with your hair," she mumbled, crossing her arms.

I turned to Rory with a look on my face that said _help_ _me_ , and he sighed and scratched his head. "You told us you were coming. Uh, we could sit down, I guess."

I followed Rory as he walked over to a small circular wooden table in the kitchen. Despite knowing them as characters, I still felt like I was in a stranger's house. The wooden chair screeched, echoing through the awkwardly quiet household as he pulled it out and sat down. I blinked at him a moment, but he didn't even look at me. He only stared at the seat in front of me, so I reluctantly fell in the seat across him.

He still wasn't looking at me. "Amy?" he called nervously.

There was a stretched silence between us before Amy responded.

"No thank you!" She shouted back stubbornly.

He sighed again and stood up. "Sorry, one minute."

He walked back over to the living room, which was only a few paces away and wasn't separated by a door. I didn't know anything, and it was making me worried and angry, because the theory of multiple universes still didn't explain how I seemed to have jumped to a different one, and the fact that I came to this one specifically... it just couldn't be a coincidence. This was my favorite TV show that my best friend and I used to bond over, even back in high school when we only had the classics. When I left for Area 51, I felt like it was the only thing I had left from my normal life, so I kept watching it religiously. The only hint I had so far was that my being here had something to do with my locket, the orb I found, and the volts we exposed it to.

It doesn't feel like just a TV show now that I was in a personable house. Area 51, much less my normal life, felt like an illusion. I also didn't know why Amy was mad at me. Rory didn't seem too mad at me, he just seemed... sorry.

I decided I might be able to figure out why, quietly getting up from my chair and pressing myself up against a wall right by the doorway to their living room.

"Amy, this is _Scarlette_ , this is someone else. We have to do what she said, we have to help her," I heard Rory whisper fiercely. Who was the other person they were talking about? How did she know I would be here? And why in the world did she tell them to help _me_?

"I can't help her! How could she just do that? All this time, helping us out, and then she goes back for him and doesn't even visit!" Amy countered back.

"She was keeping us safe, Amy. She was helping us," Rory reasoned. Who was this extra person keeping them safe?

Theory 2: I'm not in the same exact universe. This is some type of Amy-Rory centric universe?

"No she wasn't," Amy spat. "She was just too afraid. She ran away!"

"She still helped us," Rory stated. I could tell he was trying to keep his cool, and almost sighed. He was good boyfriend... or husband. Were they even married yet?

"But she never lets us help her back...." Amy trailed, sounding a little remorseful this time. Wasn't she just mad? Seriously, what was going on?

"Yeah, but we can do that _right_ _now_. And one day, when we get back to her, we'll do it again. We will," Rory promised her. Whoever this other person was, they really seemed to have some serious emotional issues with her.

I heard them getting up to move and rushed back towards the table, sitting back down as if I totally wasn't just eavesdropping on them a few seconds ago. They came into the room and sat down in chairs next to each other, falling silent, staring at me.

"So, I've met you before," I said, trying to break the ice, feeling awkward and self-conscious under their gaze.

Amy was sat next to me, and gave me a look that was a strange mix between a glare and guilt. "Yes, and we don't have much time. Look, we _have_ met you before, just..." her face morphed into one of confusion and reluctance, as if talking was hard, "not like this."

I couldn't stop staring at her. I still couldn't believe she was even real, and the words she was telling me made it even more surreal. Now she was telling me she's met me before... was it time travel?

(Absolutely ridiculous) Theory 3: I eventually invent both a time machine and a dimension transportation device, and then, for some reason, decide to transport into this universe. Or accidentally transport to this universe.

Obviously I was really running out of ideas, so I continued with questions. "Why don't we have time?"

Rory was sat right across from me, and gave Amy another look of caution before turning back to me and clasping his hands on the table. "Because you have to..." he furrowed his eyebrows, his face scrunching up in confusion just as Amy's did, "be somewhere."

"Yeah, and you told us to tell you just one thing." Amy took a deep breath and looked into my eyes. "The thing about lockets is that sometimes people don't care about how they look. Sometimes people just wear them because it's what's on the _inside_ that really matters," She stood up from her chair.

Her words sounded like they held a lot of meaning, but she recited them like math equations. "Good luck," She told me, before I was overwhelmed with a hot, fiery feeling. The last thing in my vision was Amy getting up to leave, with a sad look on her face, and Rory studying me hard from across the table.

Once again a carousel of lights and color surrounded me. It didn't last as long, but I still felt a wave of motion sickness as I made a landing.

This time, I landed lying on my side on a carpeted floor. After bracing myself through some mild nausea, I stood up again to see a bed next to me.

"Really? I couldn't have just landed on the bed!" I said to no one, in frustration. I looked around the room, feeling like I was stuck in a video game. I recognized it as the bedroom of little Amelia. It had the same blue shades and a small bed, but there were no toys lying about. Instead of dolls, there was some lipstick and a curling iron on the dresser. It didn't look like it belonged to someone little.

I shook that thought and opened the door, hearing voices out in the hall.

"You were breaking and entering!"

Once again I recognized the voice of Amelia Pond, this time yelling at the Doctor. I debated going out. They were the only people I knew here, but I knew I would change things if I joined them. I knew enough about time travel to know that simply my presence would alter the timelines. I listened to their conversation carry on exactly how I remembered it: the return of the Doctor to Amy.

"Amelia Pond hasn't lived here in a long time."

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, preparing myself. I knew I was going to change the timelines anyway, even if I didn't interact with them. But somewhere deep down, I felt that somehow I belonged in this universe, even if everything would turn out to be the opposite of what I expected. It made no sense to me, but the feeling was so strong that I felt less afraid, and that had to mean something.

I opened the door slightly, shaking. I couldn't be timid in this world. At least I've dealt with some extraterrestrials before. I could do this— I just had to force myself out there and go for it, or else I would overthink everything and never move.

With that thought in mind, I threw the door open and ran to Amy and the Doctor, skidding to a stop. The Doctor was still cuffed to the radiator, while Amy stood in front of him dressed as a policewoman with the fake radio that he still thought was real. They both stared at me in shock and bewilderment.

"And who are you?" Amy asked, as if someone spontaneously turning up in her house just wasn't that unusual anymore. Now she _didn't_ know who I was.

Theory 3: false. I mean, most likely. Otherwise our timelines would be so messed up she'd have to know who I am now.

"I'm your back-up," I replied on a whim, putting my hands on my hips. I looked to the extra room where I knew an alien was hiding, and shuddered. "That looks creepy."

Amy turned all around, trying to see what I was looking at. "What does?"

I glanced from the door and back to Amy, and realized she really couldn't see it. "How many rooms are on this floor?" I asked her.

She furrowed her brows. "Why?"

I looked all around me at all the rooms, and then at the creepy one again. "I kind of have a feeling we have different answers."

Amy stared at me hard. "Five." She pointed around at the doors. "One, two, three, four, five."

"No... Six." I retorted.

"Six?"

"How do you know that? Who are you, where are you from?" The Doctor asked me from his spot on the floor. I didn't want to answer that. I didn't even want to acknowledge him right now, because then I would also have to acknowledge how I didn't know the answers to those questions anymore. Besides, Amy is the most important thing to me right now. She might not remember, but she was there for me, along with Rory, even if they were kind of... mad. They still knew who I was, and apparently they still helped me. For all I know, they could be the only people left for me in this entire universe.

Theory 4: I appeared in a different universe where it's like Doctor Who and the people I know don't exist.

"Look." I told her, ignoring the Doctor, refusing to tear my gaze away from her.

She seemed content to ignore him also. "Look where?"

"I honestly don't know why you can't see it. _I_ can see it," I admitted, looking right at the room she was missing and tilting my head in concentration. "I wonder how that works..."

"Look where you never want to look, the corner of your eye. Look behind you!" the Doctor said.

Slowly, Amy turned her head to see the extra room. "That's... that is _not_ possible. How is that possible?"

Now it was the Doctor's turn to explain. "There's a perception filter around the door. Sensed it the last time I was here. Should've seen it."

"But that's a whole room. That's a whole room I've never even noticed."

"The filter stops you. Something came a while ago to hide. It's still hiding. You need to un-cuff me now!"

Amy slowly walked down the hall, not being able to tear her eyes away from the door. "I don't have the key. I lost it." I knew what was going to happen, and I didn't know if I should stop it.

"How can you have lost it? Stay away from that door!" the Doctor yelled. Now I was scared, even though I knew she wouldn't really get hurt.

"Should I let her? Should I?" I muttered to myself. I shook my head and ran in anyway, pushing Amy to the side.

"No! Get out of there!" the Doctor yelled. I stood in the dingy, dark brown room, and looked at the floor, not really wanting to face the alien that I knew was in here. I walked on warily. As soon as I spotted the screwdriver on the table, I snatched it. I ran out of the room as quick as I could, careful not to look anywhere else in fear of seeing the monster.

I shut the door behind me and observed the screwdriver in my hand, and pressed a button. Pointed at me, it whirred to life, and my eyes widened. "Woah," I smiled in awe.

"Don't mess with that!" The Doctor told me, who was still chained to the radiator on the floor. I stared at the glowing blue light a little bit longer before releasing the button and handing it to the Doctor. "Give me that!" He took it from me and used it on the lock of the door before trying it on his handcuffs, but it wouldn't work. "What's the bad alien done to you?" he cooed to his sonic.

"Will that door hold it?" Amy asked, getting a bit jumpy.

"Oh, yeah, yeah, of course! It's an inter-dimensional multi-form from outer-space, they're all terrified of wood!" The Doctor remarked sarcastically. Amy turned to glare at him. Under the door, a bright flash of light appeared.

"What's that? What's it doing?" Amy was only growing worried, and so was I.

"Okay, I'm done with this!" I said, as I pulled a bobby pin form the back of my head that was helping to hold two pieces of my hair back. I knelt down and grabbed the Doctor's cuffed hand. "What are you doing?" he asked me.

"Getting you out the old-fashioned way." I put my bobby pin in the keyhole and began working it around as I was taught.

"I thought the old-fashioned way was with the key!"

The lock clicked and I stood up, grabbing his hand to pull him up with me. "Nope. Not in my world!"

He looked down at his sonic and furrowed his brows, looking from it, then to me, over and over again. "What are you?"

I pulled out my necklace from under my shirt and put my hand over my heart, just checking, feeling it beating rapidly. "Human?"

He didn't seem interested in that anymore and grabbed my locket.

"What's this?"

I took it from his hand. "Mine!" I couldn't help but be slightly protective over it now. If I wasn't before, now I really was. Too many people have tried to take it away from me, and I wasn't about to let it out of my reach for a second. Whatever it was, it was definitely alien, but it did something to me that made me feel like I owned it even though its origins didn't seem to be the same as mine.

The Doctor looked at me urgently and put his hands on my shoulders, "Have you ever opened it?" he asked, almost shaking me around.

I blinked at him as if it was obvious. "No! It's broken."

He squinted at me suspiciously, before turning to Amy. "Where's the _real_ back-up?" he asked her.

Amy was still staring at the glowing door with wide eyes. "There is no back-up!"

"I heard you on the radio, you called for back-up."

"I was pretending. It's a pretend radio!"

"But you're a policewoman!"

"I'm a kiss-o-gram!" Amy exclaimed, removing her hat as her ginger hair fell free.

"Um..." I said nervously, motioning to the man in blue coveralls and his Rottweiler who were now standing in the hall.

Theory 5: I'm in the Doctor Who universe except everything is a hundred times creepier.

"But it's just..." Amy began, trailing off.

"No it isn't. Look at the faces." the Doctor instructed. The man growled madly while the dog remained impassive.

"What? I'm sorry but," Amy turned to the Doctor in disbelief, " _What_?!"

"It's all one creature. One creature disguised as two. Clever old multi-form. A bit of a rush job, though. Got the voice a bit muddled, did you?" The man and his dog both snapped their heads toward the Doctor. "Mind you, where did you get the pattern from? You'd need a psychic link, a live feed. How did you fix that?"

I furrowed my brows at the creature and turned to the Doctor, trying to make sense of his explanation. "What's a multi-form? Like a shape-shifter? Or like clones, or...."

I trailed off, expecting an explanation, but he gave me a bewildered look. I quickly looked down at the floor, realizing I was probably being like that annoying nerdy kid at the front of class all over again. He made a noise, as if he was about to say something, when the man snarled at him. The snarl turned into a gross roar, revealing long, sharp alien teeth and a worm-like tongue in the man's mouth.

"We should just... get out of here." I suggested, staring in both fear and awe at the creature, until a deep booming voice roared throughout the house.

" _Attention Prisoner Zero, the human residence is surrounded. Attention Prisoner Zero, the human residence is surrounded_." The voice repeated.

"What's that?" Amy whispered.

I shrugged. "The real back-up?"

The voice continued speaking. " _Prisoner Zero will vacate the human residence or the human residence will be incinerated_."

"NOW can we get out of here?" I pleaded, tugging the Doctor's arm.

"Yes, run! Run!" He pulled my hand to the hall and I ran down the stairs outside, Amy and then the Doctor following. The Doctor frantically locked the door with his sonic before turning to Amy.

"Kiss-o-gram?!"

"Yes!"

"Why'd you pretend to be a policewoman?"

"You broke into my house! It was this or a French maid!"

The Doctor began walking quickly, Amy hot on his heels, while I trailed closely behind.

"What's going on?" she asked, "Tell me!" The Doctor ignored her and kept walking towards the TARDIS, but Amy wasn't backing down.

"Tell me!" she yelled again.

He turned to face her. "An alien convict is hiding in your spare room disguised as a man and a dog, and some other aliens are about to incinerate your house. Any questions?"

Amy's eyes widened, probably more from the sight of the TARDIS than his explanation. "Yes!"

"I have some!" I added.

"Me too." He tried the key on the TARDIS door. "No, no, don't do that, not now! It's still rebuilding, not letting us in!"

" _Prisoner Zero will vacate the human residence or the human residence will be incinerated_." the voice roared again.

"Where is that coming from?" I asked, looking up to the sky, before noticing the man and dog barking at us from the window in the house.

Amy angrily grabbed the Doctor by the arm. "Come on," she looked to me, "You too!" I shrugged to follow, not really having anywhere else to go, but the Doctor kept resisting while Amy was still trying to tug at his arm.

"No! Wait, hang on! Wait wait wait—" The Doctor yanked himself free. "The shed!"

The Doctor jumped to the garden shed, Amy angrily stomping behind. "I destroyed that shed last time I was here, smashed it to pieces."

Amy was extremely fed up now. "So there's a new one, let's go!"

The Doctor put his hands on the shed. "But the new one's got old! It's ten _years_ old at least," He sniffed the wood before touching it with his finger and tasting it. "12 years. I'm not six months late, I'm 12 _years_ late."

He walked right up to Amy while I backed away, knowing what was going to happen. Even when she was a fictional character to me, I still felt bad for Amy. Now that she was real and we didn't even really know each other, I just felt like I was invading.

"He's coming," she told him, trying to avoid the subject. The Doctor, of course, wasn't going to let this go any time soon.

"You said six months. Why did you say six months?"

"We've got to go."

"This matters. This is important. Why did you say six months?"

"WHY DID YOU SAY FIVE MINUTES?" Amy yelled, the hurt from his twelve years of absence showing

"What?" The Doctor said, more in shock at himself than Amy, realizing he made a huge mistake.

I turned back to the window to see the man (and his dog) glaring directly at me, and couldn't take it anymore. I walked between them. "We need to leave."

**888**

After much more strange bickering between Amy and the Doctor and an incident with faulty ice-cream van music, we burst into an elderly woman's house who seemed to know Amy somehow. The woman was gripping her remote and flipping the channels in an attempt to get the big blue eye off of the screen, but I knew it wouldn't work no matter what she tried.

"Hello! Sorry to burst in, we're doing a special on television faults in this area," the Doctor lied, before remembering Amy's outfit. "Also, crimes..." The woman was glancing to Amy suspiciously. The Doctor didn't seem to be very good at lying. "Let's have a look!" he announced, snatching the remote from the lady.

"I was just about to phone. It's on every channel!" The lady told him, before giving a glare to Amy. "Hello, Amy, dear. Are you a policewoman now?"

"Well−"

"ACTUALLY," I cut her off, yelling a bit to get attention, and instantly regretting it. I probably looked ridiculous, but I had to prove to Amy that I was going to help her, and wanted to be friends. I didn't want her to be mad at me for whatever reason that may or may not happen in the future, so I thought fast. "She's in training," I lied. "She also helps Rory and I at the hospital sometimes."

Amy gave me a thankful smile, yet a questioning stare, while the lady seemed to understand.

"Oh, Amy, who are your friends?" the lady asked gently. The Doctor turned to Amy sharply.

"Who's Amy? You were Amelia," he told her.

I took a deep breath. I mostly stayed silent while they were bickering on the way over here.

Amy was offended. "Yeah, now I'm Amy."

"Amelia Pond− that was a great name!"

She stared at him like he did something wrong, and I couldn't blame her. "Bit fairy tale."

Then, the lady looked up at the Doctor with just the hint of a smile. "I know you, don't I? I've seen you somewhere before."

The Doctor grinned back at her. "Not me. Brand-new face." He opened his mouth and eyes wide, as if to prove a point, but he just looked crazy. "First time on," he turned to Amy, "And what sort of job's a kissogram?" he prodded her, again.

"I go to parties, and I kiss people," she explained simply, clearing her throat. "With outfits... It's a laugh!"

The Doctor glared at her. "You were a little girl five minutes ago!"

"Hey!" I interrupted. I decided in my head that Amy was my friend now, whether or not she knew it, and I defend my friends. Or at least I tried. "It's not her fault it's only been five minutes for you. It's been twelve whole years; she's an adult now. And she can do whatever she wants with her lips."

"Yeah!" Amy agreed, but I wasn't finished. She didn't seem to hate me for no reason (or a reason I'm unaware of) like she did before. Now I really wanted to hurry this up so I could meet Rory to see if maybe he knew me instead.

Theory 6: Rory knows me, and maybe future Amy was just jealous or felt threatened or something. Or maybe that was an entirely different universe before, and not the future... At least I'm one hundred percent sure I'm not in my home universe, because really, I'm not threatening at all.

"Now, the inter-galactic police-eye thing is..." I was just about to explain everything when I remembered that logically; there was no way I could know these things, and none of my theories were making any sense so far.

Everyone looked at me expectantly, so I cleared my throat and forced myself to continue. "Probably looking really hard, across the entire planet to find Prisoner Zero, and they probably wouldn't think twice about blowing us all up if they don't find him. We have to do something!" I panicked. Only now did I finally realize the gravity of the situation− both of the world ending, and my being here. I was starting to get scared, and I knew from all my work at Area 51 that there just wasn't time to be.

The Doctor only smiled at me. "I will find out how you know that, but for now!" He pulled up a radio and used his sonic on it to change the stations, only to find the same message playing over and over in every language. He put it down and looked back to us, and then directly at me, in surprise. "You're right. It's everywhere, in every language. They're broadcasting to the whole world."

He abruptly ran over to the window and slid it up and open, sticking his head out. He looked up to the partly cloudy clear blue sky.

"What's up there? What are you looking for?" Amy asked, crossing her arms.

He came back in. "Okay," he started. "Planet this size, two poles, your basic molten−"

"Forty percent fission blast!" I exclaimed excitedly, for figuring it out. Everyone was staring at me now, including the guy who just walked into the room. Suddenly, I felt a bit self-conscious for my knowledge. I was always getting things wrong at Area 51, and even if I got them right, it still wasn't enough. Now that I was really here with people I admired... I didn't want for them to think I was useless.

"Or... something like that. Probably. I mean, what do I know?" I trailed off nervously. I looked down at the floor that I didn't realize was so interesting before, but I could still feel their blank stares.

Everyone continued to look at me with blank stares, the Doctor moving closer to me. "What? I'm a scientist! Obviously the ship isn't the size of the entire Earth, but it can probably fit most of the population in there for radiation and need, like, less than half the beta decay..." I rambled quickly, trying to defend myself. "So... forty. Around there. Maybe."

"Okay, that's useful. Girl who knows everything about Amy is also a scientist." The Doctor approached the man who just entered the room, while I fought the urge to laugh. I definitely didn't feel like I really knew everything.

"But they'll have to power up first, won't they? So assuming a medium-sized starship, that's 20 minutes." The man was taller than the Doctor, so he had to get up on his tiptoes to try and... size him up, or whatever he was trying to do. "What do you think, 20 minutes? Yeah, 20 minutes."

He turned back to Amy and I. "We've got 20 minutes."

"20 minutes to what?" Amy asked.

"Are you the Doctor?" the man asked. My eyes widened while Amy grimaced. She looked to me as if pleading for help, but all I could do was shrug and give her a look that said, _sorry, can't help you here._

"He is, isn't he? He's the Doctor! The Raggedy Doctor! All those cartoons you did when you were little. The Raggedy Doctor, it's him!" The lady exclaimed, almost looking relieved.

Amy cleared her throat. "Shut up," she whispered to the lady.

"Cartoons?" The Doctor wondered, before going to sit on the couch. Hopefully it was all kicking in for him now. How long he's been gone, and the effect he's had on her.

The man was smiling now. "Gran, it's him, isn't it? It's really him!"

"Jeff, shut up!" Amy tried to exclaim quietly, before turning to the Doctor. "Twenty minutes to what?"

The eye was still darting around the television screen, repeating the same message from before over and over.

"Scientist girl was right, they wouldn't think twice about blowing up the planet. The human residence. They're not talking about your house, they're talking about the planet. Somewhere up there there's a spaceship, and it's going to incinerate the planet."

The Doctor hunched forward on the small couch, observing the eye on the screen. "20 minutes to the end of the world."


	3. The Eleventh Hour (pt 2)

"What is this place, where am I?" The Doctor asked, walking fast down the street with Amy and I on either side of him.

"Leadworth." Amy responded.

"Where's the rest of it?"

"This is it."

"Is there an airport?"

"No."

"A nuclear power station?"

Amy scoffed. "No."

"Even a little one?"

"No."

"Nearest city?"

"Gloucester, half an hour by car."

"We don't have half an hour. Do we have a car?"

"Does it look like we have a car?" I asked him. I was still wearing some nice boots with a little heel in it from 51, and they were just starting to hurt.

"Well, that's good! Fantastic, that is. We've got 20 minutes to save the world, and I've got a _post_ _office_." He remarked angrily, motioning to the building behind him. "And it's shut! WHAT is that?" He ran to the small patch of water.

"It's a duck pond." Amy responded, following the Doctor towards the small pond.

The Doctor stopped and peered over it before turning back to Amy. "Why aren't there any ducks?"

"I don't know, there's never any ducks!"

"Then how do you know it's a duck pond?" he asked her.

"It just is! Is it important, the duck pond?"

"I don't know," the Doctor began stumbling backwards, clutching his chest. "Why would I know?" he stammered, falling to the grass, still clutching at his hearts. "This is too soon," He grunted. "I'm not ready, I'm not done yet."

I wasn't completely sure while watching the show, but now that I was really here, I knew he was talking about his regeneration cycle. He was the last of the Time Lords, a human-looking alien species that regenerates every cell in their body to stay alive for thousands of years on end. I could only imagine how much pain that was, and how it must feel— but unfortunately, I didn't have time to imagine, because the sky grew darker.

Amy looked up. "What's happening? Why's it going dark?"

We stood there, staring at the sun, which was now turning grey-ish, until the light returned to normal and the sun became an orange that looked like it was just a colored part of the clouds. Instead of a bright star, it just looked like smoke.

"Nothing, you're looking at it through a force-field. They've sealed off your upper atmosphere, now they're getting ready to boil the planet." He stood up, while Amy gaped at him, her eyes popping open in shock.

I tilted my head at the sun, wondering. "How do you seal off an upper atmosphere with a plasma field if it's, like, four percent water vapor?"

Amy was frustrated. "They're going to burn the planet, and you're concerned about _how_?"

"It's not plasma," the Doctor answered me, before I could respond to Amy.

In front of us, the villagers began walking out into the green with their cell phones and cameras, speculating the transformed sun. "Oh, and here they come, the human race! The end comes, as it was always going to— down to a video phone!" The Doctor snapped.

But unlike the Doctor, I knew this was coming in more ways than one. Not only did I know the exact events that were about to unravel due to having seen it on a TV screen— I knew that they were going to take out their phones even if I hadn't watched the show.

At Area 51, I was partnered with Dylan, who worked in the field to retrieve artifacts while I tested them, and Meredith, who worked with him live and hacked things so he could break in easier. The only case where I found an artifact myself was the orb that may or may not have gotten me here. During that mission by myself, the most important thing I did was make sure no one saw. Out of the three of us, Meredith was the techie, it being her job and all, but I convinced her to teach me things until I became good enough with technology to prepare myself for my lone mission. Now I have hacks to wipe all data around me from a 5-mile radius, because that's what humans of the 21st century do: we trap our memories in objects that we trust more than ourselves, so people believe us. Even though I didn't do that much spying around, I've learned how to translate my shock into adrenaline. I learned how to tune everything out and focus on the matter at hand.

Amy, though, hasn't had any training. Not even police training, contrary to her outfit. She shook her head in disbelief. "This isn't real, is it? This is some kind of big wind-up." She fumbled with her hands nervously, trying not to bite away at her perfect red nail polish.

"Why would I wind you up?" The Doctor asked her, probably not understanding what she meant.

"You told me you had a time machine." She said anxiously.

"Well... you believed him," I told her.

"Then I grew up." She replied, looking down.

The Doctor groaned. "Oh, you never want to do that— no hang on, shut up, wait! I missed it." He smacked himself right in the forehead, causing both Amy and I to jump. "I saw it and I missed it!" he smacked himself again. "What did I see? I saw... what did I see?" He looked straight ahead and seemed to be lost in a calculating trance. He glanced to Rory, who just took a picture of a man on his phone, and then to a clock, before turning back to us.

"20 minutes. I can do it. 20 minutes, the planet burns. Run to your loved ones and say goodbye, or stay and help me." He looked at us expectantly, but I only raised my eyebrows and turned to Amy, while she glinted at him.

Amy furrowed her brows. "No."

The Doctor looked bemused. "I'm sorry?"

"NO!" Amy yelled, grabbing the Doctor by his tie, and grabbing me by my locket. She dragged us both over to the car of a man who was getting out of the driver's seat.

"Amy! No! No! What are you doing?" The Doctor yelled, at the same time I shouted "Hey!" She pushed us against the car while the driver just stepped out, slamming his tie and my locket stuck in the door. She took the driver's keys and locked the door.

Immediately, I felt weak. As soon as my long chain was caught in the door, I felt dizzy and fought to stay standing.

"Are you out of your mind?!" The Doctor asked.

Thankfully, she disregarded me at the moment and moved closer to the Doctor. "Who are you?"

"You know who I am," he hissed.

"No, really, who are you?"

"Look at the sky! End of the world, 20 minutes."

"Better talk quickly then!" Amy commanded, backing off of him.

"Stop... yelling," I groaned, feeling weaker, collapsing in the Doctor's arms. I couldn't make out what was happening, but I knew it had something to do with the locket. The sense of belonging was gone, and I felt empty in both the mental and medical sense. Lonely, and light-headed.

The Doctor held me tightly in his arms, while Amy unlocked the car and handed the keys back to the driver.

"Hey, stay with me," the Doctor pleaded, as he opened the door and his tie and my necklace were free. When the necklace was free, I was able to stand up and I grabbed it. Somehow, it didn't break— it only dented a little. The Doctor was still holding me from around my waist, and our proximity was so close I could feel his breath. I closed my eyes to try and focus on what I meant to say. I knew there was something that had to happen that was missing, but the pain was distracting.

Suddenly, I remembered, and shot my eyes open. "Apple!" I exclaimed.

"What?" The Doctor and Amy both said. I only smiled and awkwardly reached into the Doctor's pocket, taking out the apple that little Amelia had given him 12 years ago, or 10 minutes ago.

I put the apple in Amy's hand, and she turned it over to see the fresh carved-in smiley face. "It's real," I explained, both for Amy's sake and my own. "Him. He's the Doctor, he really is, and he needs your help whether or not he wants to admit it, and I do. I need your help too."

Amy shook her head. "What do you need my help for? Who are you?"

"I'm lost, Amy," I admitted, wanting to cry on top of the weakness I was still recovering from. This was it. She had to trust me, because I already trusted her, and she knew me in the future. The Doctor still had no idea who I was, but I was one hundred percent certain she would know me. "I know it's hard to understand, but 10 minutes ago, he was in your past, I was in your future. I don't know why I'm here but you did, or you will. You _have_ to help me." I begged, conveniently leaving out the part where her future self was mad at me for some reason I didn't think I wanted to find out anymore.

She still stared at me with bewilderment, and I felt the Doctor's burning gaze also. "How do I help you?" she asked.

"Believe him. Just for 20 minutes. The apple, it's fresh. Time travel. 20 minutes." I whispered, before collapsing in the Doctor's arms again.

My eyes were closed, but I was still conscious. I was just too weak to hold myself up. I was leaning against the Doctor, who had his arms around me, but he removed one of his arms. I couldn't see, but I knew that this was the moment where he was grabbing Amy's wrist. She was glancing at the apple, and back at him. She believed. In my mind, a symphony played in the background− Amy's theme. This was the real beginning.

"What do we do?" She asked, getting her game face on.

"Finally!" I breathed, exhausted. I felt the Doctor kiss me on the forehead, and my energy returned while my headache left.

I stood firmly on my feet, but before I realized that he had probably given me some of his regeneration energy, he was already moving.

"Stop that nurse!" he yelled, running over to the nurse Amy and I knew to be Rory and checking his cell phone before giving it back to him. "The sun's going out, and you're photographing a man and a dog. Why?"

Amy and I ran up to either side of Rory, but Amy clung to his arm.

"Amy!" he noticed.

"Rory!" I exclaimed.

"Do I know you?" he asked.

I wanted to scream. Theory: what number was I even on, 7? False, again! Where was the logic behind anything? Rory didn't know me, Amy didn't know me, the Doctor definitely didn't know me— and with everything happening so fast, I felt like I barely knew myself anymore.

Still, stupid me yelled his name, and now I had to come up with an excuse fast, because I really didn't feel like going through the whole _I was in your future_ thing with him. He wasn't really mad at me back then, or back... forward, anyway. "Uh, yeah. Scientist, hospital?" I tried, knowing Rory probably met lots of people throughout the day.

"Umm, oh! Right, yeah, you're..." He stuttered, pretending he knew me out of politeness.

Close enough. I nodded. "Yeah!"

"This is Rory," Amy introduced to the Doctor. "He's a... friend."

Rory smiled sheepishly. "Boyfriend."

"Kind of my boyfriend."

"Amy!"

The Doctor didn't seem to care for any of our relationship statuses at the moment. "Man and dog, why?"

Rory looked him up and down. "Oh, my god, it's him."

"Just, answer his question, please." Amy ordered impatiently.

Rory couldn't stop pointing and gaping at him. "It's him, though. The Doctor, The Raggedy Doctor."

"Yeah, he came back..."

"But he was a story. He was a game−"

Thankfully, the Doctor was having none of it either and grabbed Rory by his shirt. "Man and dog− why? Tell me. Now!"

"Sorry! Because he can't be here, because he's−"

"In a hospital, in a coma." Rory and the Doctor chanted at the same time.

"Yeah," Rory nodded frantically.

"Knew it. Multi-form, you see? Disguise itself as anything, but it needs a live feed, a psychic link with a living," the Doctor poked Rory's forehead, "But dormant mind."

The multi-form alien still disguised as the man and his dog barked and growled, causing us to snap our heads around. The Doctor walked to it, standing directly across the lawn. "Prisoner Zero."

I walked to stand right next to him, while Amy and Rory stayed back.

"What, there's a Prisoner Zero too?" Rory asked Amy.

"Yes!" She snapped.

The big police-eye hovered above us in its spaceship that looked like it was made of electric crystal. The blue eye swiveled back and forth, casting what looked like a searchlight. The Doctor took his sonic screwdriver out of his pocket and held it out to his side.

"See, that ship up there is scanning this area for non-terrestrial technology. And nothing says non-terrestrial like a sonic screwdriver." He smiled and held his sonic up and turned it on, the familiar whirring sound causing victorious chaos. Street lamps around us were bursting with electricity, car windshield wipers were swiping back and forth, and even shopping carts and fire trucks were moving by themselves. I couldn't help but give a little laugh, and the Doctor smirked at me in response.

"I think someone's going to notice, don't you?"

The Doctor lowered his screwdriver to point at a nearby telephone box, causing it to explode, but backfiring and causing the screwdriver to fry itself. "No, no, no, don't do that!" The Doctor ranted, dropping his burnt screwdriver to the ground. The big eye-police spaceship wasn't distracted enough.

"Look, it's going." Rory pointed out.

"No, come back, he's here! Come back!" The Doctor shouted, flinging his arms around. "He's here! Prisoner Zero is here! Come back!"

Prisoner Zero, however, wasn't here for very long and glowed before turning into a mist and melting down the drain below them.

"Doctor! The drain, it just... sort of, melted and went down the drain." Amy said, all three of us noticing the drain now.

"Well of course it did." The Doctor shrugged.

"How does it even do that?" I muttered to myself. Rory gave me a strange look, and shrugged.

"What do we do now?" Amy asked the Doctor.

"It's hiding in human form. We need to drive it into the open. No TARDIS, no screwdriver, seventeen minutes, come on... Think. Think!" The Doctor yelled to himself. Of course, I knew the solution, but I wasn't sure if I should bring it up, and I was kind of scared to, so instead I stepped back.

I couldn't tell them, but that didn't mean I couldn't do anything. Every single one of my already useless theories were debunked, and I was sick of following around these people I didn't even actually know waiting for answers to show up, because obviously that wasn't going to happen. It looked like if I was going to figure out anything, I would have to do it myself. Now there were no other scientists around to scoff at me and tell me I was way off, or ignore me when I had a question. For once, I had no other choice than to conduct and trust my own research.

"You know what, I'm still feeling a little dizzy... I'm gonna go." I announced, lying just enough to turn and make my way back to the last house we were at, where the elderly lady and Jeff live.

The Doctor grabbed my wrist and turned me back around, stopping me in my tracks. "No no no, I need you here."

I almost let out a laugh. "Why would you need me?"

The Doctor frowned, probably detecting my insecurity, thinking that was the main reason for my lie. "Why wouldn't I?"

I had already seen the Doctor's life without me in it, and although there was pain and suffering, it was okay in the end. His companions were amazing and beautiful people with ridiculously correct moral compasses, and although I desperately wanted to, I wasn't sure if I could be that. I wasn't even meant to _be_ in this world. I was from a world where no one needed me, and they probably never will. How could he possibly think he needed me when he didn't even really know who I was?

I stared at the Doctor a moment longer, realizing something I probably should have thought of before opening the door from Amy's room. He didn't know who I really was, and... he shouldn't.

"Because," I said, taking my arm from his grasp. "You don't even know my name."

I turned and ran away quickly, slowing down once I was on a sidewalk far enough away.

I knew that the Doctor knew I was lying about still feeling dizzy. He gave me his regeneration energy through a forehead kiss so I could feel better. He's only known me for about, maybe an hour at the most, and he was already feeling compelled to save me. I couldn't tell whether or not that was a good thing. Normally, I'm perfectly capable of saving myself, but medical problems are different story. I guess since he's still fresh from his new regeneration, he didn't think it would matter, since he wasn't giving me years of his life. Either way, I knew that since he'd given me some of his energy, he had to feel different towards me now.

I knew that there was nothing I could do but shake off the thought and continue walking, so I did. I guess when you live in a small town, you don't really have to worry about the little things— like locking your doors, for instance. Or at least that's what I concluded as I strolled right into the house and into Jeff's room, where he was lying on his bed with his laptop.

He seemed startled as he looked at me with wide eyes, gripping his laptop. I raised my eyebrows, knowing what he was watching, but plastered a smile on my face anyway. "Hi... Jeff, can I borrow that?" I asked, going to sit at the edge of his bed.

"Uh, yeah, hold on." he clicked some things before giving it to me. I sat crisscrossed next to Jeff and set the laptop in front of me, opening the Internet first.

"God, Jeff. If you're not going to get a girlfriend, at least delete your history!" I grimaced, as Jeff stumbled to apologize for his... habits.

"Um, that's just... I don't- wait, what are you doing?" he asked, noticing my matrix of code on the screen.

"Well," I began, my fingers expertly flying all over the keyboard. "All governments around the world are probably panicking, and if this is anything like it is back home, all the big scientists are doing what they always do in a crisis."

"What are they doing?"

"Having a meeting," I answered nonchalantly. "Don't worry, I do this all the time. It's how I'm always the first to get new Hubble Telescope pictures. Hopefully these codes are the same..." I typed one last string of code before slamming the enter key victoriously. "Ha! They are!" I exclaimed, as the new faces on my screen talked on.

"Can't they see you?" Jeff wondered.

I smiled at him. "Not unless I want them to."

Jeff was about to react when the bedroom door slammed open, revealing the Doctor still looking disheveled. "Hello! Laptop..." he stopped himself short as he recognized me already sitting there.

I turned the laptop to face him as he stared at me with a bewildered look yet again, and an awkward silence filled the air. "Umm... Scientist," I told him, trying to come up with a quick explanation for how I was able to break into a classified meeting.

It was kind of easy to learn how to get into them, because while there are many science nerds in the world, the ones who are crazy enough to actually hack into these conferences just so they can get one of the first glimpses at a new discovered galaxy end up working for them soon enough, once the companies realize there was someone capable of bypassing their firewall. Hacking is one of the only crimes you may not get arrested for. I like to think that I would be working for them too if the US Government didn't forbid me. I also liked to think that even though the government is the reason why I was capable of doing such things, I would still find a way. So needless to say, there aren't very many people trying to get into these, so it's not that impressive. It's nothing compared to the stuff Meredith could do, anyway.

The Doctor spun the laptop back around and sat next to me, making Jeff move to sit behind us. "What kind of scientist?"

I shrugged. "What kind of Doctor?"

He squinted at me a moment before turning back and bringing the laptop onto his lap. "Ah, and here they all are. All the big boys: NASA, Jordell Bank, Tokyo Space Centre, Patrick Moore."

"You can't just hack in on a call like that!" Jeff argued, trying to look over our shoulders.

I shrugged, forgetting that half the things I learned how to do at 51 were kind of illegal for the rest of the population. "I just did."

Jeff gave a smirk and moved right behind me, "That's hot."

I was so caught off-guard by the comment I barely reacted. But somehow, this caught the Doctor's attention and he turned back to Jeff and flicked him on the forehead. Jeff rubbed his forehead in pain. "Oi! Sorry, didn't know you two were..."

My eyes widened as I realized what the Doctor had started. Why he started it, I had no idea. "Oh, we're not really−"

"HELLO!" the Doctor yelled to the screen, interrupting us.

I raised my eyebrows. I am _so_ in a different universe.

I guess he figured out how to get off my 'spy mode', because when I peered over his shoulder to fit myself in the camera, he was holding his psychic paper up to it.

"Who are you?" One of the experts asked.

"This is a secure call! What are you doing?" another one panicked.

"Hello. I know. You should switch me off. But before you do, watch this." The Doctor went on to type while the experts continued babbling on in confusion.

"It's here too, I'm getting it." One of them complained.

"Fermat's Theorem, the proof, and I mean the real one, never seen before. Poor old Fermat, got killed in a duel before he could write it down." The Doctor looked at me solemnly. "My fault, I slept in. Oh! and here's an oldie but a goodie- why electrons have mass. And a personal favorite of mine, faster-than-light travel with two diagrams and a joke." I leaned closer the screen in awe as different diagrams showed up. "Look at your screens. Whoever I am, I'm a genius. Look at the sun. You need all the help you can get. Fellas, pay attention." I let out a bewildered giggle at his clever madness. The Doctor turned to me and handed me Rory's phone.

"Do you know the basic CSS reset code?" he asked me. I nodded at him. "Great, I need you to type it in here," he handed me Rory's phone, which was already on some sort of command prompt he set up.

I snatched the phone and began typing the code furiously. Despite knowing the code, I felt like I was cheating. I didn't necessarily have to figure out that I needed to hack onto the call, and put the virus on the phone. I already knew that it would all happen anyway without me here from watching the show. But when the Doctor got up and moved to the desk, negotiating with the scientists, the show felt like it was from an entirely different lifetime. Right here, right now, this felt real.

I sat next to him at the desk and continued typing away on the small mobile. The code was pretty basic-- any 12-year-old in a robotics club would know how to do it (or at least according to Meredith who taught it to me), but the program I was typing it into looked beyond anything I knew. It was definitely some futuristic-alien thing the Doctor had set up. "Sir, what is she doing?" A scientist asked. I couldn't bother to respond, I was too concentrated on the code and afraid I would mess up if I turned somewhere else for even a second.

Thankfully, the Doctor spoke for me. "She's writing a basic computer virus on a program I created. Very clever, super-fast, and a tiny bit alive, but don't let on. Why is she writing it on a phone?"

"Done!" I interrupted, slapping the phone in his outstretched hand with glee.

The Doctor began typing again. "Never mind, you'll find out. Okay, I'm sending this to all your computers. Get everyone who works for you sending this everywhere. Email, text, Facebook, Bebo, Twitter, radar dish— whatever you've got. Any questions?"

"Uh," I muttered, filling in the silence. Great question. Way to go, Scarlette!

"What does this virus do?" Someone else asked.

"It's a reset command, that's all. It resets counters, it gets in the Wi-Fi and resets every counter it can find. Clocks, calendars, anything with a chip will default at zero at exactly the same time. But, yeah, I could be lying, why should you trust me? I'll let my best man explain." The Doctor finished, and everyone went silent, waiting for the best man.

The Doctor leaned over to Jeff, who was sitting next to him on the other side. "Jeff, you're my best man," he whispered.

"Your what?" Jeff whispered back.

The Doctor pulled the laptop monitor down for some privacy and put a hand on Jeff's shoulder. "Listen to me. In ten minutes, you're going to be a legend. In ten minutes, everyone on that screen is going to be offering you any job you want. But first, you have to be magnificent. You have to make them trust you and get them working. This is it, Jeff. Right here, right now. This is when you fly. Today's the day you save the world."

The Doctor gave him a little slap on the shoulder, and Jeff just stared at him like he was a lunatic. "Why don't you just let me do it? I know how," I reminded the Doctor. Being the youngest at 51 meant there were a lot of things the head scientists didn't let me do, so over the years I've gotten better at convincing them.

The Doctor turned around and grabbed my hand. "Not you, I need you."

I let out a distressed laugh. "For what!" I asked, frustrated. No one has ever needed me before back in 51, or at least I've never felt like it. This entire situation was completely ridiculous. Almost nothing made sense to me, and I wasn't used to that.

"Why me?" Jeff asked, too busy with his own problems to hear what we said.

"Because it's your bedroom, now go go go!" The Doctor responded, getting up and leaving. I followed him out, before he turned and opened Jeff's door again. "Oh, and delete your Internet history."

I laughed. "That's what I said!"


	4. The Eleventh Hour (pt 3)

"We need a vehicle." He told me, running off again.

I looked around and grabbed his arm back to stop him, pointing at a fire truck. "Found one!" I climbed in and sat next to the Doctor, who took the driver's seat. When he began driving, Rory's phone rang.

"Do you mind?" the Doctor asked me. It took me a moment before realizing that he wanted me to answer it. I tried not to think about it as I reached into his pocket again and took out Rory's phone. I saw that Amy was calling and answered it, holding it up to the Doctor's ear.

"Look in the mirror!" The Doctor told her. I couldn't hear what she was saying, but after a few seconds he spoke again. "Don't worry. I've commandeered a vehicle," he assured her, slamming a button that turned the sirens on. I took the phone back and hung up.

"WHAT'S YOUR NAME?" The Doctor yelled to me over the sirens.

"Oh, um−" I tried, but the phone rang again. It was Amy, of course, and I pressed the answer button and held it up to the Doctor's ear again.

"Are you in?" he asked. I looked at him hopefully. I knew what was happening at the hospital. By now, Amy and Rory had run into Prisoner Zero in the form of a woman and two little girls. It wouldn't be long until things got messy.

"You need to get out of there!" The Doctor told her again. "Amy? Amy, what's happening? Amy, TALK TO ME! Which window are you?  _Which window?_ " Eventually they were finished and I hung up. Before I realized it, we were already parked by the hospital.

"You need to tell them to duck!" He told me, heading towards the back of the truck where the ladder was.

"Right!" I nodded, sending a text to Amy on Rory's phone saying 'DUCK!' "You're going first." I told the Doctor, and he nodded and began climbing up the ladder into the 9th floor. I followed after him and we jumped in the hospital window, right behind Rory and Amy who were crouched on the floor.

"Right! Hello! Are we late? No, three minutes to go. So still time." The Doctor walked to face Prisoner Zero again, and just like before I stood by him while Amy and Rory were behind us.

"Time for what, _Time Lords?_ " the Prisoner Zero lady said to us.

" _Lords?_ " I whispered, getting a strange feeling in my chest.

The Lady squinted at the Doctor, and the Doctor smirked. "Take the disguise off. They'll find you in a heartbeat. Nobody dies."

"The Atraxi will kill me this time. If I am to die, _let there be fire._ " There was a menacing clicking to her voice, reminding everyone of the creature behind her and its disgusting teeth.

"Oh-ho kay! You came to this world by opening a crack in space and time. Do it again− just leave." The Doctor insisted.

"I did not open the crack." Prisoner Zero responded.

"Somebody did."

"The cracks in the skin of the universe− don't you know where they came from? You don't, do you?"

I took a deep breath, and closed my eyes, thinking of the adventures ahead for him.

"Oh, but _she_ does, doesn't she? And you can't say a word about it." I shut my eyes tighter, as if it would somehow will the alien away. "What did he say? A blessing and a curse?"

My eyes flew open. "No! _What_? How do you know that?" I shouted, remembering one of the last words Dylan ever said to me back in Area 51. There was no way this alien could know he said that; no way she could know about my other life. I tried to run to her, but the Doctor grabbed my hand and pulled me back next to him.

"Oh, sweet Scarlette. You never get to have a choice. Tell us, what kind of scientist are you again?" The Prisoner said. All I could do was shake my head. I was a bit reluctant to tell the Doctor that I worked for Area 51, because we don't have the prettiest history, to say the least, but that was just me personally. Other people I knew took pride in it, and hated that they couldn't tell anyone.

So how did Prisoner Zero know I wasn't proud of it? I theorized that the alien must have some sort of psychic ability.

" _Yes_." Prisoner Zero responded to my thoughts, out loud. I jumped a little, but then glared at her. "The universe is cracked. The Pandorica will open. Silence will fall."

I looked up at the clock as it clicked. "And we're off! Look at that," The Doctor smiled. He pointed at the clock. " _Look at that!_ "

The clock had all zeros, and I knew that the plan had worked. "Yeah, I know, just a clock, whatever. But do you know what's happening right now? In one little bedroom, my team are working. Jeff and the world. And do you know what they're doing? They're spreading the word all over the world, quantum fast. The word is out. And do you know what the word is?" The Doctor asked.

"Zero?" I said for him.

"Yes! Now, me, if I was up in the sky in a battleship, monitoring all Earth communications, I'd take that as a hint. And if I had a whole battle fleet surrounding the planet, I'd be able track a simple old computer virus to its source in, what, under a minute? The source, by the way, is right here." The Doctor held out Rory's phone where I typed the virus from, and big bright lights shone through the windows. "Ohhh! And I think they just found us."

"The Atraxi are limited. While I'm in this form, they'll still be unable to detect me. They've tracked a phone, not me." Prisoner Zero corrected.

"Yeah, but this is the good bit. I mean, this is my favorite bit. Do you know what this phone is full of? Pictures of you. Every form you've learned to take, right here. Oh, and being uploaded about now. And the final score is: no TARDIS, no screwdriver- two minutes to spare!"

He held his arms out in glee. "Who da man?!"

I huffed a little under my breath trying to hold in my laughter, while Zero glared at him and Amy and Rory cringed at him. The Doctor looked around at their reactions. "Oh, I'm never saying that again. Fine."

"Then I shall take a new form." Prisoner Zero told him.

I remembered this part, and I remembered that the Prisoner took the form of Amy, but there was a problem. In the show, Amy woke up because she went in the room and saw Prisoner Zero-- but I went in instead. Now, somehow the creature had to take _my_ form.

I blocked my thoughts by thinking of Amy, and ran up to the Prisoner again, making sure the Doctor wouldn't hold me back. I held my hands out. "A volunteer? Or are you giving up so soon?" The lady alien asked.

"No-- why are you doing that? You can't do that! It should take _months_ to form a link, but now you're offering yourself!" The Doctor panicked.

"I'm sorry!" I cried, both for sacrificing myself, and for everything to come. The creature glowed, and I collapsed to the ground.

**888**

Immediately, I fell into a dream state, and I was back in the extra room in Amy's house. I looked at the brown wood panels in front of me, and slowly turned around to see Prisoner Zero in its true form, all blue and worm-like with those horrifying teeth. "You must not tell the Doctor of what is to come, or you will cease to breathe."

"What?" I asked, staring right into the creature's eyes.

"You volunteered yourself. I can plant any psychological state into your brain... including death."

"What do you mean? What's in it for you?"

"His death, of course, it must be on time. You are not _needed_ to keep the timeline, but you could break it. We are watching. Not a word, or you will be taken."

**888**

I woke to Amy and Rory both holding me. "Are you okay?" Amy asked, looking honestly worried. I blinked a little. I didn't feel like I was dreaming when Prisoner Zero took my form, it felt like I was really there.

"He did it. The Doctor did it." Rory assured me.

"No, I didn't." I turned to see the Doctor still standing in the same place, with Rory's phone in hand.

"What are you doing?" Rory asked him.

"Tracking the signal back. Sorry, in advance."

"About what?"

"The bill." The Doctor brought the phone up to his ear. "Hey! I didn't say you could go! Article 57 of the Shadow Proclamation. This is a fully established, level 5 planet, and you were going to burn it? What...? Did you think no-one was watching? You lot, back here. Now!" The Doctor hung up the phone and tossed it back to Rory, looking as though he wasn't sure whether or not he regretted his decision. "Okay. Now I've done it."

He left and Amy followed immediately while Rory stayed with me, dumbstruck. "Did he just bring them back? Did he just save the world from aliens, and then bring all the aliens back again?"

"Well, pretty much," I shrugged, helping Rory up and quickly running after them.

"Where are you going?" Amy asked the Doctor, as he burst through double doors, us following. I ran up right behind him.

"The roof! No, hang on." The Doctor turned into the changing room and began taking shirts from lockers and flinging them.

"What's in here?" Amy asked.

As the Doctor flung shirts back, Rory knelt to pick them up. I helped him while the Doctor answered. "I'm saving the world— I need a decent shirt— to hell with the raggedy. Time to put on a show!"

"You just summoned aliens back to Earth. _Actual_ aliens," Rory began, as the Doctor started taking his shirt off. "Deadly aliens, aliens of death, and now you're taking your clothes off..." He gave Amy a look of embarrassment, not knowing what to do. "Amy, he's taking his clothes off. "

"Turn your back if it embarrasses you." The Doctor replied simply.

"Are you stealing clothes now? Those clothes belong to people, you know." Rory looked to Amy. "Are you going to turn your back?"

Amy smirked and crossed her arms. "No− "

"Yes you are!" I told her in a singsong voice, grabbing her arm and turning her.

"What, and not you?" She asked me.

"I'm not the one with a _kind-of boyfriend._ " I raised my eyebrows.

Rory threw his hands up. "Thank you!"

I smiled and crossed my arms, but then slowly turned my back also, and Amy laughed at me a little. Moments later the Doctor was done, wearing some jeans with suspenders hanging freely, a shirt with about four undone ties around his neck, and some new boots. "Okay... roof!" He ran up some stairs and we followed until he threw a door open and stepped out onto the rooftop.

"So this was a good idea, was it? They were leaving." Amy complained.

The Doctor walked right up to the Atraxi spaceship, which looked like a giant blue eyeball with crystals sticking out of it. Amy and Rory stayed by the door, and I slowly walked up to stand next to the Doctor. "Leaving is good. Never coming back is better. Come on, then! THE DOCTOR WILL SEE YOU NOW!" he yelled to the Atraxi.

The giant eyeball disconnected from the ship and scanned me first. "You are hiding. Reveal your true form."

"True form? What form?" I questioned, looking to the Doctor for help, but he only gave me a knowing smile and stepped away from me.

"The Atraxi sees past looks. Reveal inside." The eyeball voice said.

I had no idea what it was talking about, and began scrambling my brain for some type of answer. I threw my hands up in defeat, before putting them against my head in concentration. "Inside, inside..." I muttered, trying to figure out what the eyeball meant. "Oh!" I exclaimed, remembering what Amy said to me when we first met.

_'The thing about lockets, is that sometimes people don't care about how they look. Sometimes people just wear them because it's what's on the inside that really matters.'_

That _had_ to be what she meant. Apparently I told her that, and if that sentence was the first thing to pop into my head when the Atraxi said that... it just _had_ to be. Were things finally starting to make sense?

I grabbed my locket and stared at the red crystal, and for the first time in my life, I took a chance, and opened it.

A bright light shone from it, and then a bright light shined from me. Once again, I was overwhelmed with heat, but this time, it really hurt. Every single part of me felt like it was being ripped apart, and I flung my arms out and couldn't help but scream. When it was over, I felt like I had been put back together. I felt completely refreshed, and took a deep breath. Somehow, I felt more powerful, and when I exhaled, I knew why. Golden mist flowed from my mouth, and I realized what had happened.

I regenerated.

The Atraxi scanned me again. "Thank you. You are not of this world." 

I swallowed hard.

I knew I wasn't of this world, and I felt it in my bones. I didn't understand it, but now it was official. The inter-galactic government-police-eye-thing or whatever the Atraxi was had confirmed it. I wasn't of this world, and I knew the world I was from was Gallifrey, but for some reason I couldn't remember a different life like I knew Time Lords were supposed to. All I remembered was my human life, and facts about Gallifrey, as if a personal textbook had been mentally downloaded to me. I felt like I had been there, but I did not have a life.

Suddenly, I knew all about Gallifreyan history. I knew it was located in the constellation of Kasteborous, at galactic coordinates 10-0-11-00:02 from Galactic Zero Centre. I knew it had an orange sky, snow-capped mountains, and fields of red grass. I knew about the Capitol, the High Council, and the President. So why didn't I know anything about myself? Then again, I had a locket instead of a fob watch like The Master and the 10th Doctor had.

I was completely overwhelmed with information and beautiful visions. There was absolutely no bad information or anything about the Time War, just beautiful landscapes and basic history.

Now I had maybe thirty new theories. And with this new alien information in my head, absolutely all of them made zero sense.

The Eye moved to scan the Doctor, who I felt staring at me. I remembered that I was supposed to change appearances, and I didn't know what I looked like now. Hopefully it wasn't bad, seeing how the Doctor wouldn't take his eyes off me.

"You are not of this world." The eye said.

"No, but I've put a lot of work into it." He pulled up his red suspenders and began examining his ties. "Hmm, I don't know, what do you think?" He asked, picking out a tie.

"Is this world important?" The Atraxi asked.

"Important? What's that mean, _important_?" He threw a tie to Rory and began getting angry. "Six  _billion_ people live here, is that important? Here's a better question: Is this world a threat to the Atraxi?" He threw another tie that landed on Amy, and she handed it to Rory.

"Well come on, you're monitoring the whole planet. IS this world a threat?" The Doctor prodded.

The eyeball produced a hologram of the Earth, and then began flashing through scenes of Earth history, as if scanning for threats.

"No." The Atraxi boomed.

"Are the peoples of this world guilty of any crime by the laws of the Atraxi?" The Doctor asked again. Now the hologram produced pictures of hope and love, hate and destruction, and humanity− the whole beautiful package. The package that I feared I was no longer a part of.

"No." It confirmed once again.

"Okay. One more, just one. Is this world protected? Because you're not the first lot to come here." The hologram began projecting images of the aliens that have tried to take this world before. "Oh, there have been so many! And what you've got to ask is... what happened to them?" The hologram projected pictures of the Doctor, from his first incarnation all the way to his tenth, until the eleventh one right next to me stepped through it, fully dressed in his tweed jacket and bowtie. "Hello. I'm the Doctor. Basically... run."

I ran next to Amy to watch the spaceship fly away and we both laughed. I turned to smile at her and she hugged me.

I laughed even more, almost wanting to cry. Even after seeing me regenerate, Amy wasn't scared of me. She welcomed me, and I couldn't help but wonder what happened in the future to make her cold to me when I needed welcoming the most.

Unfortunately, I knew the moment couldn't last long. "Gotta go!" I rushed, running down the stairs and out the hospital, not daring to let the Doctor out of my sight.

**888**

I was really hoping that regenerating into a Time Lady and all would maybe boost my health a little and help me run faster, but the Doctor was extremely fast. Even all the running I had to do for Area 51 hadn't prepared me for the wild goose chase I was currently on, almost running into cars, jumping over fences, and all while yelling "DOCTOR!" over and over.

Thankfully, after making it back to Amy's garden in front of the TARDIS, the madman had finally stopped running. He was barely breathing a little faster than usual, while I was just a few paces behind him, panting and hunched over. Even with my loud breaths, the Doctor somehow still hadn't noticed me and went on to gape at his TARDIS.

"Okay! What have you got for me this time?" He said to the machine, pulling out his key and sliding it into the lock.

"Seriously?" I exclaimed, wondering how in the world he could get so distracted by his box that he forgot he wasn't the only Time Lord left anymore. I felt the change and the heat. I felt more powerful. I had all this Gallifreyan history in my head, and I was not going to let him ignore me now.

The Doctor stopped working on the lock and turned to me, and gulped. "Hello again. I'm... The Doctor." He greeted me. He walked over to me and slowly stretched out his hand. "And you are?"

I remembered everything Amy told me about the locket, and I knew the deeper meaning behind it. It was cheesy, but during the time I went to high school, I had a friend named Deevia who always took every opportunity to tell me, _"it's what's on the inside that counts!"_ , and I knew that Amy wasn't just talking about the locket back then... or, back forward. She was also talking about me, being a Time Lady now, and not being Scarlette anymore. I could leave everything behind, and I could change. I could be _new_. According to the information stuck in my brain, I had to choose a Time Lord name now, and for some reason, I felt it. Scarlette probably wasn't my real name anyway.

Slowly, I reached out my hand and held his. I didn't even shake it, I just held it there, both of us in anticipation of my new name.

" _Nova_ ," I told him confidently.

He smiled at me. "Well," he began, letting go of my hand. "Good to meet you, Nova. So what do you say− wanna see a TARDIS? It's brand new, it's been rebuilding."

All I could do was smile and nod. He went back to work on the key and opened the door, standing in the doorway for a little while to take his new TARDIS all in with the widest smile on his face. "Oh, you sexy thing! Look at you!" He walked in, and I followed slowly behind him, taking in every single detail.

I knew what to expect from the show, the yellow hue, the circular lights, the metal grating of the floor and the quirky center console, but the show didn't even begin to do the vessel enough justice. The center console was filled with tons of little gadgets I hadn't bothered to notice on screen. The pillar in the middle of it was clear, with what looked like a magic mix between a liquid and mist inside it, moving up and down. The walls were a warm blend of yellow and orange, and the lights on it were gleaming with life. When you walked in, you could feel that the TARDIS wasn't just a machine-- it was a powerful being.

The Doctor spun happily around the console, pushing buttons and pulling levers here and there, before looking back to me. "So? What do you think?"

I walked from my spot in the doorway up to the console and put my hand on it, almost petting it absentmindedly. I gave out a little laugh and spun around. "It's... alive," I observed.

The Doctor frowned at me a little. "Well of course it's alive. You're acting like you've never been in a TARDIS before." he told me, eyeing me carefully. I didn't want to respond and break his heart... or, hearts, explaining to him how I haven't. I knew he had been running away from his mistakes for hundreds of years in hope of maybe finding one more of his kind somewhere in the vast universe. He just needed one person who could understand him, and all he got was me: Someone who was some sort of copy of a Time Lord. A wanderer with a mental textbook on Gallifrey. Not someone who shared his pain and suffering, and could help him with it. Just me.

The Doctor walked closer to me. "Nova, what do you remember?"

"Well..." I began hesitantly. "I remember my human life like it was real. Like I'm somehow still human. When I opened this," I explained, grabbing my locket and refusing to tear my eyes from it, scared of seeing the Doctor's broken ones. "All I got was this... textbook. Like someone just put all these facts about Gallifrey in my head. Everything from Politics, to Geography, and the simple things. What it felt like to roll down the golden plains, and play in the red grass of someone's backyard. Like I was there, but... I wasn't."

I could have sworn I heard him sigh. "Interesting. I've never seen a fob watch quite like this before." He commented, grabbing the locket from me. "Remarkable."

I continued staring down at the floor, until the Doctor let go of it.

"Okay, don't tell me what you know, then. Tell me what you feel."

I looked up at him and made a confused face at my own words, "Like... I'm supposed to be here."

The Doctor cleared his throat and went back to work on the console. He pulled a lever and the lights flickered, sending us off into space. "Then maybe you are."

My eyes widened as I realized we had left. "Wait, what are you doing? Where are we going?!" I panicked.

"Jus a quick hop to the moon, run her in." he responded simply.

I shook my head, knowing what would happen. "But, Amy!" I argued. I remember that he left her for two extra years, but I also feared that he wouldn't go back for her, because I'm here instead. I mean, I liked the Doctor and all, but not enough to fly across all of time and space alone with him. Really, he was still a man I barely knew.

"Don't worry, we're already back." I was only slightly relieved. He walked over to the TARDIS doors and stepped out. I took a deep breath and quickly followed. I looked at the house to see Amy standing in her nightgown.

I turned back to the TARDIS, and to the scene in front of me again.

It was nighttime. Amy was in her nightgown. I know that she was mad and all, and the Doctor was just really casual about everything, but I just time traveled. Even if I was, apparently, now a Time Lady, I still felt like an excited little girl... Who just time traveled. Like, actually,  _traveling_ , _through_ _time_. So you can understand why I was grinning like an idiot, and maybe let a out a really tiny squeal. "That— I just, I mean, time! Travel!" I managed to exclaim, my head swirling with excitement and new information.

"That was just a little hop. Just wait and see how far we can go," the Doctor smiled at me. I was way too ecstatic about actual time travel to think about how he so easily implied I would be traveling with him.

The Doctor fiddled with the TARDIS lock before turning to see Amy standing there. "Sorry about running off earlier. Brand new TARDIS, brand new Time Lord. Bit exciting. Just had a quick hop to the moon and back to run her in. She's ready for the big stuff now."

Amy walked up to us, "It's you. You came back." She glanced to me, sounding slightly bitter, "And we were wondering where _you_ had gone off to." 

All I could do in response was give a pained face that read _I'm sorry._

"Course I came back. I always come back. Something wrong with that?" The Doctor asked, defensively.

"And you kept the clothes." Amy noticed.

"Well, I just saved the world. The whole planet, for about the millionth time, no charge. Yeah, shoot me. I kept the clothes."

"Including the bow tie."

"Yeah, it's cool. Bow ties are cool."

"Are you from another planet?"

"Yeah."

"Okay... and you too?" Amy asked, looking to me.

I could only shrug. I felt like I was from another planet, but... Earth was still my home. Then again, I knew Gallifrey had trees with silver leaves that reflected the morning sunlight, so sometimes the forest looked like it was on fire. "I guess so."

"Weren't you human before? You don't look alien." She told me.

"Look what? Wait, how do I look?" I asked her, completely forgetting to see how I looked after regenerating.

"Oh! I'll get that," The Doctor said, running back into the TARDIS and coming back out with a mirror in hand. I looked up at him cautiously and grabbed the mirror, holding it up to my face.

I was disappointed to find that I literally looked exactly the same. Every single aspect of me, even my height, had remained the same. I was kind of hoping I would change, because I honestly thought my face and body were pretty average, especially standing next to Amy.

"That's not right, is it? I look exactly the same," I said, touching my face and running my hands through my hair.

"It just means you're in your first regeneration. Children on Gallifrey don't change their appearance much so they can cope with it better." The Doctor explained to me.

"I'm not a child!" I countered.

"No, you're not. Plus, Gallifreyan children are technically already decades old. So, what do you think?" He asked, looking to Amy and I, standing next to each other. "Both of you."

"Of what?" I asked.

"Other planets. Want to check some out?" The Doctor grinned.

"What does that mean?" Amy asked this time.

"It means... Well, it means— come with me." He was rocking back and forth a bit now, and I could tell he was nervous to ask.

"Where?"

"Wherever. You. Like."

Amy looked at the TARDIS. "All that stuff, the hospital, the spaceships, Prisoner Zero..."

"Oh, don't worry. That's just the beginning. There's loads more."

"Yeah, but those things, amazing things, all that stuff..." Amy's demeanor changed as she stepped closer to the Doctor. "That was _two. Years ago_!"

"Ooh-oh!" The Doctor's grin faltered just a little. "Oops."

"He means sorry," I said to her, giving the Doctor a look.

"Yeah." Amy said.

"So that's..." the Doctor cautiously trailed.

"Fourteen _years_!" Amy shouted.

"Fourteen years since fish custard. Amy Pond. The Girl Who Waited, you've waited long enough."

Amy couldn't stop glancing to the TARDIS. "When I was a kid, you said there was a swimming pool and a library, and the swimming pool was _in_ the library."

"Yeah. Not sure where it's got to now. It'll turn up. So... coming?"

Amy glared at him now. "...No."

"You wanted to come fourteen years ago."

"I grew up."

"Don't worry," the Doctor said, turning back to the TARDIS, "I'll soon fix that."

He snapped his fingers, and just like that, the TARDIS doors opened. A warm orange glow bathed Amy as she looked back to the Doctor and I and gave a laugh. Slowly, she entered, looking completely overwhelmed.

The Doctor closed the door behind us. "Well...? Anything you want to say? Any passing remarks? I've heard them all."

"I'm in my nightie," was all Amy could get out.

"Oh, don't worry. Plenty of clothes in the wardrobe. And possibly a swimming pool. So... all of time and space," The Doctor dashed around the TARDIS, "everything that ever happened or ever will... Where do you want to start?"

"You are _so_ sure that we're coming."

"Yeah, I am."

"Why?"

"Cause you're the Scottish and American girls in an English village, and I know how that feels."

"I don't live in England." I told the Doctor.

He stopped tinkering around and stared at me. "Where do you live?"

"Nevada. You know, United States of America," My simple answer felt boring.

"Then how did you get here?"

"Uh, well... I don't exactly know..." I trailed.

"How do you not know?" Amy asked. "Didn't you say you were in my future?"

"I was! And now I'm _here_... And that's pretty much it. But I have these..." I stopped myself from saying theories. "I think it's this. I pressed in this gem like a button and then I wasn't at work anymore, I was in your future," I explained to Amy.

The Doctor gave me the slightest worried look. "Do you want to go home?"

Even if I could go back to the right Area 51 in my universe, where all this wasn't real, I'm not sure I would still want that. I was living in an apartment, mostly by myself since my dad was gone often. In this universe, who knows if I even exist? I'm not even human anymore. Due to previous episodes of Doctor Who, I knew of the consequences of inter-universe travels, because there's always something different... in a way you least expect. Sometimes it seems harmless and small, but it always makes the biggest difference. There was no way the Doctor could take me to either Area 51 for so many reasons, and if he could, the reasons still remained. Besides... I knew what was going to happen here. I knew exactly what I would be getting into.

I took a deep breath. "I can't. So I guess I'm coming."

He paused a little before turning to Amy. "And you?"

"Can you get me back for tomorrow morning?"

"It's a time machine. I can get you back five minutes ago. Why, what's tomorrow?"

"Nothing. Nothing. Just... you know, stuff." I looked to her and raised my eyebrows. I wouldn't exactly call my wedding _stuff_.

"All right, then. Back in time for stuff." The TARDIS made a beeping noise, and his new sonic screwdriver rose from the console. "Oh! A new one!" He tested it out, the familiar green glow accompanying the sonic whirring. "Lovely, thanks dear." He whispered to the machine, before toggling some levers. 

I walked back up to the console from my spot on the stairs as Amy tried pulling a knob.

She turned around with a gasp, and I knew it was time for her to worry about herself. "Why me?"

"Why not?" The Doctor responded.

"No, seriously. You're asking me to run away with you in the middle of the night, it's a fair question. Why me?"

The Doctor continued maneuvering the TARDIS "I don't know. Fun. Do I have to have a reason?"

"People always have a reason."

"Do I look like people?" He asked expectantly, glancing up to look at her.

"Yes!"

"Been knocking around on my own for a while— my choice— but I've started talking to myself. It's giving me earache."

"You're lonely. That's it? Just that?"

"Just that. Promise." he walked around to face her, and I anxiously tried to glance at the TARDIS monitor without making it look so obvious.

On the monitor, was the crack like the one on Amy's wall. To the Doctor and Amy, it was just a mysterious crack. But to me, I knew it was a rip in the fabric of time and space, and where all the silence were leaking out of. The Doctor's downfall.

"Okay." She answered simply, while the Doctor turned the monitor off, looking at it as if scolding the TARDIS for leaving it there, as a reminder of the possibility that he was breaking his promise.

I walked up to the railing to stand next to Amy. "Are you okay?" I asked her, ignoring the fact that I was feeling really weird myself.

"I'm fine. It's just... There's a whole world in here, just like he told me when I was a kid. It's all true. I thought, well, I started to think that maybe he was just a madman with a box." She couldn't stop looking up at the different TARDIS levels in awe as she admitted this, seeing how much bigger it really was on the inside.

"Amy," I told her, grabbing her by the shoulders and making her face me. "Look at him. He's ridiculous," I said to her, looking over to the Doctor, who had now shifted his attention to us. I smiled. I knew this line by heart, but it didn't feel like a line as I said it. "He's definitely a madman with a box."

She started laughing, and I laughed with her, reminding myself of the time we laughed as the Atraxi flew away. Only this time, I wasn't going to run away-- I was going to stay right by her side. 

"We're really doing this?" She asked in disbelief.

I nodded. "We are!"

"Ha-ha!" The Doctor grinned, looking at us from the console. We each went to stand on either side of him as he turned back around and set his hands on some levers. "Goodbye Leadworth, Hello Everything!"

And with that, he pulled the lever down, and we held on tight as we felt ourselves rush forward, all the way to the 29th century.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a lot of people stop reading after this part because they don't want nova to be a time lady. so i'd just like to take the time to state two reasons as to why you should keep reading: 
> 
> 1) although nova is biologically a time lady, she still feels human, acts human, and i truly try my hardest to develop her as a character and not let her be a mary sue. 
> 
> 2) i am a senior in high school now (chapter edited 3/26/17) and i have been working on this story since sophomore year. EVERY random detail that might seem cheesy or irrelevant will count in the long run-- this entire series is very interconnecting, and if you keep reading it, you might be able to piece things together and figure out who nova really is before i actually reveal it!
> 
> i know this chapter and the few others after it may seem like nothing is changing in canon and nova really fits in there like a puzzle piece, but eventually, as she becomes more sure of her place in the universe, she starts changing things.
> 
> of course you don't have to read it if you don't want to. and if you do you don't have to vote, comment, or anything. if you read it and you're happy about it that's enough for me! however i do reply to all comments (unless it's just like, a single heart emoji) if you have any questions!
> 
> it feels kind of stupid but i've had this story in my head forever and i've really put a lot into it. so i hope you enjoy it ❤️


	5. The Beast Below (pt 1)

I was simple, as a little girl. All I wanted was to touch the clouds on an airplane and expect them to feel like cotton candy. I didn't start to like space until later in high school.

Amy, however, had been dreaming of space ever since the police box crashed in her backyard. This is why the Doctor was holding her ankle while she floated up in space, her hair flowing in the atmosphere, and I just hugged the side of the TARDIS and looked out into the stars, waving my hand around, trying to take in the fact that this was real. This was really happening.

"Come on, Pond." The Doctor said, pulling Amy back inside. "Now do you believe me?"

She laughed while he let go of her. "Okay, your box is a spaceship. It's really, really a spaceship." I smiled at her and let my leg swing out of the TARDIS while she yelled. "We are in space! Woo!" She laughed again and took a deep breath. "What am I breathing?"

"Yeah, how does-- Woah!" I let myself swing out too far and almost lost my grip on the TARDIS door, but thankfully I felt someone tug me back by the arm. I twisted myself to try and turn around, but that only caused me to stumble even further, into the Doctor's arms.

"Thanks," I blushed, pulling away from him before he could respond and stood next to Amy, who shook her head at me.

"I've extended the air shell, we're fine." The three of us looked down to see grimy skyscrapers floating by on the starship below us. "Now, that's interesting. 29th century," The Doctor went back to the console and began messing with it again, and I followed him. "Solar flares roast the Earth, and the entire human race packs its bags and moves out till the weather improves. Whole nations..."

"Doctor?" Amy started, but he kept on talking.

"...migrating to the stars,"

"Doctor?!" She asked again. I walked over to her to see her hanging on to the outside of the TARDIS floating upwards and panting fearfully.

"Isn't that amazing?" he rambled.

"Doctor!" I yelled, and he immediately looked up to see me trying to grab for Amy. He walked over to us and smiled. "Well, come on. I've found us a spaceship!" He was able to reach up to Amy and help her down steadily and led us to a small window.

"This is the United Kingdom of Britain and Northern Ireland— all of it, bolted together and floating in the sky. Starship UK. It's Britain, but metal. That's not just a ship— that's an idea. That's a whole country, living and laughing and... shopping." Amy chuckled, but all I could do was smile sadly. I knew that the idea had gone wrong, and a poor creature was being tortured, but I still wasn't sure about what I was and wasn't allowed to say, so I let him continue. "Searching the stars for a new home."

"So..." I trailed.

"Can we go out and see?" Amy asked excitedly.

"Course we can. But first, there's a thing." The Doctor walked back over to the TARDIS monitor.

"A thing?" Amy asked, following.

"An important thing. In fact, thing one-– we are observers only. That's the one rule I've always stuck to in my travels. I never get involved in the affairs of other peoples or planets." I snorted a bit to myself. "Ooh! That's interesting," he remarked, looking at a little girl crying alone on a bench in the TARDIS monitor.

"So we're like a wildlife documentary, yeah? Cause if they see a wounded little cub or something, they can't just save it— they've got to keep filming and let it die." Amy remarked sadly, staring at the girl I knew to be Mandy on the screen.

"Don't worry, he's totally lying," I almost smiled to myself, remembering what people said about him all the time. "Rule one."

"What do you mean?" she asked me. But before I could answer, the Doctor appeared on the monitor, consoling the little girl. I smiled a bit when he turned to face the camera and motioned for us to come out. Amy and I both rushed out of the TARDIS without a second thought, only for both of us to be taken aback by the sight before us.

"No. Freaking. Way," I gasped, looking out to the land that most would consider ugly and rusty. But to Amy and I, it was... amazing. It was a market, and there were stands selling different things in an organized chaos that only markets could pull off. I jumped around and looked up to see windows along the ceiling that gave a perfect view of outer space.

Amy wandered around also. "We're in the future. Like hundreds, of years, in the future."

She stopped spinning in circles and stared at the Doctor in horror, who we had just caught up to. "We've been dead for centuries!"

"Oh, lovely. You're a cheery one." The Doctor began walking. "Never mind dead, look at this place. Isn't it wrong?"

"What's wrong?" Amy asked naively, still spinning around in wonder.

"Use your eyes. Notice everything. What's wrong with this picture?" The Doctor asked us.

"Nova," The Doctor poked me. "Do you see it?"

"Uh..." I racked my brain for an answer that didn't sound stupid, but wasn't the right one, because I was still worried about messing with time, and the threat of Prisoner Zero. Unfortunately, I didn't act quickly enough, because the Doctor had already moved on. Now ' _uh_ ' was my answer, which made me sound even more stupid than I had feared.

I brought my hand to my forehead. This was going to be difficult.

"Is it... the bicycles?" Amy tried, pointing to a rickshaw. "Bit unusual on a spaceship, bicycles."

"Says the girl in the nightie." The Doctor told her.

"Oh, my god I'm in my nightie!" Amy realized in horror.

The Doctor only smiled. "Now, come on, look around you. Actually _look_."

"London market is a crime-free zone." An automated voice droned. I turned to see a creepy clown-like ceramic face in a booth smiling menacingly and shivered.

"Life on a giant starship, back to basics." The Doctor explained. "Bicycles, washing lines, wind-up street lamps. But look closer. Secrets and shadows, lives led in fear. Society bent out of shape, on the brink of collapse. A police state. Excuse me—" He grabbed a glass of water from a nearby table where a couple was dining and put it on the floor. 

"What are you doing?" The man asked, but the Doctor only stared at the glass intently, and I knew why. If this ship ran on engines, which it wasn't, the water would be vibrating. 

Unfortunately, it was completely still, because instead of engines, a giant, lonely, and beautiful creature was keeping this ship floating through space. Once again, I knew the solution to the problem, but this time I was not on Earth. This time, I couldn't run away and get a head-start.

"Sorry, checking all the water in this area. There's an escaped fish." The Doctor set the glass back on the table and tapped the side of his nose before returning to Amy and I. "Where was I?"

"Why did you just do that with the water?" Amy asked.

"Don't know. I think a lot. It's hard to keep track. Now, police state— do you see it yet?"

"Where?"

The Doctor snapped and pointed. "There."

He was pointing at Mandy, who was still crying alone on the bench. Everyone around her was ignoring her, even the adults.

Then, it clicked. I didn't have to be a wildlife documentary and sit back and watch things unravel. Besides, Prisoner Zero said I couldn't tell the Doctor, but he never said anything about anyone else. Obviously, the alien made a big mistake when he threatened me, because if there's one thing about me that will never change, it's that I am never the type of girl to wait around. I could find loopholes. I could _do_ something.

Right on cue, Amy and the Doctor ran to the little girl, and I turned around to see a hooded figure with an amulet. I knew who he worked for, and I knew the complications of it. If the Doctor was a legend here, what were the chances that I was one too? I was a Time Lady now, after all. There had to at least be a story or myth about me if I traveled a little more with the Doctor. 

Either way, I had to do _something_. I had to take a chance, even if it was just something small.

The man raised his head slowly and stared at me. I winked at him, before dashing off to follow Amy and the Doctor.

**888**

Somewhere in the Starship, a grey-haired man picked up a ringing phone. "Are you sure?" He looked into his monitor to see a man in a bowtie staring directly at the camera.

"Saw it myself. And the girl, she winked at me. She must know. Are you going to tell her?" The man in the phone booth answered.

"We're under orders to tell her." The grey-haired man answered simply. "Well done. Keep tabs on them, especially that Glowing Girl... we cannot risk her disappearing." He hung up the phone and dialed a different number.

In a different room, a woman in a dark red cape answered her phone.

"Sorry to interrupt," The man apologized. "There's been a sighting. London block, Oxford street, a man... and The Glowing Girl."

"Did he do the thing?" She asked.

"Apparently."

"And The Girl?"

"She... winked, but there's a slight problem, ma'am."

"What is it?"

"She isn't... _glowing_ much."

The woman in the red cloak gulped. She knew that this meant it was going to get difficult. "I'll have a look on the monitors." She grabbed her white mask and stood, walking past the glasses filled with liquid and the chandelier on the floor, unmoving.

**888**

"One little girl crying. So?" Amy asked the Doctor. Amy was casually sitting in between us on the red park bench that was just a few benches away from where a crying little girl I knew to be Mandy was sitting.

"Crying silently." The Doctor turned to us, "I mean, children cry because they want attention, because they're hurt or afraid. When they cry silently, it's because they just can't stop. Any parent knows that."

"Are you a parent?" Amy questioned. The Doctor only stared at her for a moment, as if she figured him out.

"But it's not just that," I cut in, staring at Mandy curiously. "She doesn't want attention either, but here she is, out in the open. It's like she knows no one will pay attention to her. And no one is, because... no one can do anything about it anyway." I tensed as I finished my sentence, my mind trailing back to a distant memory.

**888**

_"Hey, it'll get better, Darla," I reminded the brunette little girl, grabbing her hands in mine._

_She sniffled and shook her head, bringing one of her hands up to wipe the tears from her face. "No it won't," she spoke softly. "No one can do anything."_

_I squeezed her hands and looked back to see all the older people talking quietly on the red landscape behind me, and noticed something peculiar. I turned back to the little girl and smiled. No one else could do anything, but being in my position... I might be able to do a little something._

_I smiled at her mischievously. "I can."_

**888**

Amy waved her hand in front of my face. "Nova?"

I blinked and stared at her, reminding myself that I was on the Starship UK, not on...

"Are you alright?" The Doctor asked me.

"I'm alright. I just... remembered something," I smiled to myself a bit. The vision flashback-thing I got was a little blurry and very short, but I was nearly a hundred percent sure it was from my old life on Gallifrey. I almost couldn't believe it, but it felt right. It made sense.

Amy sighed. "So, they aren't helping her?"

The Doctor nodded. "Exactly. They're not helping her, so it's something they're afraid of. Shadows— whatever they're afraid of— it's nowhere to be seen, which means it's everywhere. Police state."

I gulped and tried my hardest not to look towards the smilers, which was really the police state. Those things were really starting to creep me out. 

"Where'd she go?" Amy asked, noticing Mandy got up and left.

"Deck 207, Apple Sesame block, Dwelling 54A. You're looking for Mandy Tanner. Oh," The Doctor reached into his jacket and pulled out a colorful ID wallet. "This fell out of her pocket when I accidentally bumped into her. Took me four goes." He handed the wallet to Amy. "You go and ask her about those things— the smiling fellows in the booths. They're everywhere."

Amy took the wallet. "But they're just things."

"They're clean," The Doctor explained. "Everything else here is battered and filthy— look at this place. But no one's laid a finger on those booths. Not a footprint within two feet of them. Ask Mandy, ' _Why are people scared of the things in the booths_?'"

"No. Hang on— what do I do?" Amy whispered, "I don't know what I'm doing here and I'm not even dressed!"

"I'll go with you." I suggested to her. "Come on, Amy! We're on an entirely different planet, entirely different century! There's so many things here we can't even imagine!" I explained enthusiastically. I kind of just wanted to roam around and see what was new while they did what they were supposed to. But considering I didn't blow up Earth last time, I trusted myself enough now to stay out of the way of the timelines while still being with them. Besides, Amy was smarter than people gave her credit for. If I remember correctly, she ended up figuring this one out all on her own in the end.

"But—"

The Doctor seemed to agree with me, and cut her off. "It's this or Leadworth. What do you think? Let's see. What will Amy Pond choose?" Amy glared at him and crossed her arms, slumping in her seat stubbornly, defeated.

"Ha-ha, gotcha!" The Doctor cheered, checking his watch before standing up. "Meet me back here in half an hour."

"What are you gonna do?" Amy asked him in a mocking voice.

"What I always do, stay out of trouble," Amy and I both gave him a look. "Badly." He remarked, jumping over the bench and walking away.

"So this is how it works, Doctor?" Amy asked, turning around to face him. "You never interfere in the affairs of other peoples or planets, unless there's children crying?"

The Doctor smiled at her. "Yes."

I waved at him before turning back and trying to look around for a street name. "Okay, so what was that thing he said?" I asked Amy, who turned back also. "207, Apple, something..." I trailed, beginning to walk around. The place was a little dingy, sure, but it was still amazing and futuristic. The technology that I noticed so far had a 90s look about them, but even from afar I could tell that they were beyond anything I knew. I kept walking quickly, trying my best to ignore the smilers and find Mandy.

"You're really liking this." Amy noticed, trailing close behind.

I shrugged. "Well, yeah, it's not everyday that this stuff happens." I turned a corner and took the wallet from Amy.

"Yeah, but you seem... used to it." She commented.

I wandered further into the darkness with Amy. "I'm a special kind of scientist, Amy. And I... know." I tried to explain.

"Know?" Amy asked me. I was just about to attempt to explain that I pretty much knew everything that was going to happen to her, until someone interrupted us.

"You've been following me." Amy and I turned to see Mandy leaning against the wall, still dressed in her school clothes. "Saw you watching me at the market place."

"Yeah," I said, handing the wallet to her. Mandy snatched her wallet from me and walked away, only to stop in front of a construction detour surrounded by barriers that were all too familiar to me.

"What's that?" Amy asked, looking at the tent and signs.

"There's a hole. We have to go back." Mandy told her simply. I knew what was in there and what would happen, and that I had to go through with it.

Slowly, I began towards the barrier, feeling the smiler staring at me. "A what? A hole?" Amy wondered.

"Are you stupid? There's a hole in the road. We can't go that way." Mandy scolded. 

Amy walked in front of me to the barrier, pushing it aside, while Mandy continued on. 

Mandy didn't seem to notice for the moment. "There's a travel pipe down by the airlocks, if you've got stamps... What are you doing?" 

I walked through the barrier with Amy and turned to Mandy.

"Hey, where's America?" I asked Mandy, in an earnest attempt to distract her.

"On their own ship." She replied, as if it were obvious, which it probably should have been.

I nodded. "Right. Just wanted to check."

There was an awkward silence as Mandy eyed me. 

"...Well, I never could resist a 'Keep Out' sign." Amy told her, breaking the silence and going to sit in front of the lock. "What's through there? What's so scary about a hole? Something under the road?"

Mandy glanced to the smiler in the booth nervously, checking to make sure that it was still... well, smiling. "Nobody knows. We're not supposed to talk about it."

Amy turned to her and cocked and eyebrow mischievously. "About what?"

Mandy faltered a little. "Below."

"Want to know a secret, Mandy?" I whispered to her, making sure that Amy couldn't hear. Maybe I could get her to work with us better if I told her I knew.

"Not really." She responded bluntly.

I smiled. "Well, too bad. Because I know what's below, and it's alright." I leaned forward and whispered in her ear. I couldn't remember the name of the little boy she was friends with, but I hope she still understood. "Your friend. He's okay," she gave me a wary look, but I could tell it was filled with slightly more hope. I moved to sit next to Amy at the tent entrance. "Now, we're about to do something very stupid, so just stand back." I told Mandy.

Amy pulled out a hairpin and began to pick the lock. 

"You sound Scottish." Mandy commented to Amy.

"I _am_ Scottish. What's wrong with that? Scotland's got to be here somewhere..." Amy wondered, continuing at the lock.

"No. They wanted their own ship."

"Hmm. Good for them. Nothing changes." As Amy got closer to picking the lock, I looked to the booth to see the smiling face turning, literally turning, into a sad one.

Mandy was only getting more nervous, but I could tell that she didn't want to leave us. "So... how did you get here?"

"Oh, you know, just traveling around with this guy." I attempted to explain.

"Your boyfriend?" Mandy asked me.

"No," I responded, as the same time Amy froze in realization and said, "Oh."

"What?" Mandy asked her.

"Nothing. It's just... I'm getting married. Funny how things slip your mind." Amy mumbled.

"How does marriage just _slip_ your mind?" I questioned her. She gave me an apologetic look.

"When?" Mandy asked her.

"Well, it's kind of weird. A long time ago, tomorrow morning. I wonder what I did..." She asked herself, until the lock clicked and opened. "Hey, hey, result! Coming?" She asked Mandy.

"No!" She declared, stepping farther away.

"Suit yourself." Amy shrugged, going in the tent. I looked at the booth one last time and saw the smiling machine turn into a raging angry face, and went in the tent after Amy anyway, not wanting to look at it anymore.

I crawled in to see that Amy had a wind-up flashlight in her hand and she turned it on to point it at the tentacle poking out of the ground. "Ew," I said, followed by a stunned "Oh my god," from Amy. I was almost surprised at her reaction. I had been secluded in Area 51 for so long that I nearly forgot that the majority of the population was not very accommodated to seeing anything even remotely alien-like.

Amy looked at it closer. "That's weird, that's..."

She moved her flashlight up to see a stinger, and I immediately pulled her back by the arm as it tried to attack her. "Out, out! Get out!" I yelled, as we both scooted out backwards. I looked up to see hooded men wearing gold amulets much like the one I ran into before, and knew what was coming. I grabbed Amy tighter as one of the men held his fist in front of our faces. I stared into the ring on his hand and let the man spray mist from it to my face, knowing where I would end up.

**888**

The Doctor climbed down a ladder and leaned his head against a wall to listen, scanning it with his screwdriver a bit. "Can't be." He muttered, turning to see a glass of water on the floor, the liquid inside it completely still. He got down on the floor to examine it closer.

"The impossible truth in a glass of water. Not many people see it." The Doctor looked up to see a woman wearing a white ceramic mask and a red cape with dark, curly hair. He stood up to face her. "But you do, don't you, Doctor?" she whispered.

"You know me?" He asked.

"Keep your voice down!" She whispered harshly to him, glancing back a moment. "They're everywhere. Tell me what you see in the glass."

"Who says I see anything?" he asked curiously, stepping closer to look in her eyes.

"Don't waste time. At the marketplace, you placed a glass of water on the floor, looked at it, then came straight here to the engine room. Why?"

He raised his eyebrows. "No engine vibration on deck. Ship this size, engine this big, you'd feel it. The water would move. So...I thought I'd take a look." He walked over to open a power box on the wall. "It doesn't make sense. These power couplings, they're not connected. Look— they're dummies, see?" He showed her the wires, disconnected, before walking to the wall across the hall and tapping on it. "And behind this wall, nothing. It's hollow. If I didn't know better, I'd say there was..."

"No engine at all." The lady finished for him.

"But it's working, this ship travels through space. I saw it."

"The impossible truth, Doctor. We're travelling among the stars in a spaceship that could never fly," she whispered vigorously, trying to get the Doctor to keep his voice down also.

"How?"

"I don't know. There's a darkness at the heart of this nation. It threatens every one of us. Help us, Doctor. You and Nova. You're our only hope. Your friend is safe and so is Nova." She handed him a small GPS device. "This will take you to them. Now go, quickly!" She turned to walk away.

"Who are you? How do you know who Nova is? How do I find you again?"

She turned back to him for just a moment, still whispering. "I am Liz 10, and I will find you."

There was a rumbling sound and the lights flashed, and when the Doctor turned back to her, she was already gone. He looked at the GPS, and thought of the one question she didn't answer.

**888**

I woke up in what seemed like seconds later, staring in the face of a smiler.

"Ah!" I yelled, jumping up from the seat I was in. I turned around to see I was in a small, dark metal room with a screen in front of me. Just under the screen were the three infamous buttons that read _protest_ , _record_ , and _forget_. I turned to my right to see a knocked out Amy sitting there also.

Why we were together in the same voting cubicle, I didn't know, but I was thankful anyway. Maybe the voting rules of the future were different.

"Amy! Wake up!" I shook her as she slowly blinked her sleep away. The moment she was conscious again, the machine in front of us began speaking.

"'Welcome to voting cubicle 330C. Please leave this installation as you would wish to find it. The United Kingdom recognizes the right to know of all its citizens. A presentation concerning the history of Starship UK will begin shortly. Your identity is being verified on our electoral roll. " The machine recited, as Amy sat up in her chair, and I shrugged and sat back in mine next to her.

"Where are we?" she asked me.

"Um, voting cubicle 330C?" I tried. Amy turned to me with a sarcastic look, but there was a small grin behind it.

"Name— Amelia Jessica Pond. Age— 1306." The machine stated.

Amy gasped. "Shut up!" She laughed.

"Look at that, dead for centuries!" I laughed with her.

"Martial Status..." The machine slowed a bit, and Amy sat up straighter, curiously. I knew that she was curious about whether or not she would marry Rory a long time ago tomorrow, and once again, I still didn't know if I should tell her.

"Unknown." The machine recited, and Amy slumped back in her chair.

"How come it doesn't recognize me?" I asked.

Amy turned to me as if it were obvious. "You're American. They were probably just too lazy to go through all the protocols and threw you in here with me." She explained. I nodded, and tried to settle for that explanation, fighting the feeling that there were so many more layers to all this any of us could imagine.

Soon the screen blinked to show a man with greying hair. "You are here because you want to know the truth about this starship, and I am talking to you because you're entitled to know." When the man on the screen began talking, I stood up behind my chair. "When this presentation has finished, you will have a choice. You may either protest...or forget. If you choose to protest, understand this. If just 1% of the population of this ship do likewise, the program will be discontinued, with consequences for you all. If you choose to accept the situation— and we hope that you will— then press the 'forget' button. All the information I am about to give you will be erased from your memory. You will continue to enjoy the safety and amenities of Starship UK, unburdened by the knowledge of what has been done to save you. Here, then, is the truth about Starship UK, and the price that has been paid for the safety of the British people. May God have mercy on our souls."

All I knew was that I could not press the button. Whatever happens, whatever I see, I had to try to resist.

As the images of the history of pain and destruction the kingdom had faced filled the screen, it became harder and harder for me to breathe. I found myself hyperventilating, and reached my hand to pull out my locket from under my shirt. Out of habit, I gripped it for dear life.

Only much like before, I was not only gripping it, I was pressing a button.

**888**

I was overwhelmed with a hot, fiery feeling I wished I would never have to face ever again. Colors and lights surrounded me in a beautiful chaotic mess, until it simply ended, and I found myself landing again. I was panting as I stared at the familiar floor below me. I only had seconds to recollect myself until I heard a familiar voice calling my name-- only it wasn't really my name anymore.

"Scarlette! Oh my god!" I felt a pair of strong arms wrap around me. I turned my head to see Dylan's light green eyes looking at me with concern, before he pulled me in closer and buried his face in my neck. I closed my eyes to let the nausea reside, before someone pulled me from his grasp.

I turned to see Professor Zodiac looking at me with a face that was a mix between anger and relief that most parents got when their children went missing in a store. Only the Zodiac wasn't my father, and I had a feeling that the amount of trouble I was in was completely out of his control. He peered down at me over the tops of his round glasses. "You, young lady, have a lot of explaining to do."

**888**

Before Amy even realized it, her hand had slammed on the protest button, and she reached up to wipe her tears she didn't remember forming. She looked up to the screen to see a video of herself being played, frantic, in tears.

"This isn't a trick. You've got to find the Doctor and get him back to the TARDIS. Nova is gone. She's gone! Don't let him investigate. Stop him. Do whatever you have to. Just please, please get the Doctor off this ship!"

Amy turned to the doorway to see Mandy and the Doctor there, and turned off the video of herself that was playing on a loop. "Amy?" The Doctor asked her, stepping into the room. "What have you done?"

He looked around. "Where's Nova?"

Amy gulped as tears formed in her eyes. "She's... She's gone."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's lit!!! (i wrote this chapter in 2014, before 'it's lit' was even a popular saying. now it is march 23, 2017, and this chapter has been edited.)
> 
> where did she come from? where did she go? where did she come from cotton eye joe?!?!?!


	6. The Beast Below (pt 2) Area 51 (pt 2)

I was pacing back and forth in a white room for about three minutes when the door finally opened. In walked my best friend Meredith and Professor Zodiac with stoic looks on their faces as they sat on the two chairs on the other side of the equally white table. I glared at them in disbelief as they pulled out their clipboards and began setting up the lie detector as professional as ever.

You'd think that with how worried and relieved Dylan had been to see me back, everyone else would react the same way. You'd think they would make me out to be the victim, but of course, this is America. So instead of first being sent to get a medical exam and make sure I was alive and okay and had only one heart, I was trapped in the interrogation room like some kind of _criminal_. Even worse, my best friend and my mentor were the prosecutors. 

This is Area 51 we're talking about. Weird stuff happens everyday, but there is never a constant. I had no clue what type of questions they would ask me, and I was worried that I had to lie. Not because of the polygraph machine, though. During my training, I was taught how to beat those machines, so why they went through all the effort to bring it out really beats me.

No, what I was really worried about was having to lie to two out of the four people in my life. Or in my... more normal life. In all honesty, I didn't work with or pay much attention to any other coworkers, because they always seemed to shun me no matter how hard I tried to be nice to them. Many of them had been sheltered from the outside world since the 80s, so sometimes it was just hard to communicate on the same level. I wasn't used to having only four friends, either. I had plenty of friends in high school, and one best friend named Deevia, so when I was officially stuck here, I promised myself I would keep the friends I have and do anything for them. I never wanted to lie to them, but now, as I put my hand to my chest and felt two different heartbeats, I knew that I didn't really have a choice.

Oddly enough, that wasn't even the strangest part. The strangest part was that I still had my locket around my neck, and no one even looked at it. It was as if it was invisible, even though I could touch it and see it. I stared down at the glowing crystal, with my hand still over my chest, and wondered if I could go back if I pressed the crystal again.

So as I stood leaning against the wall, glaring at my best friend and mentor with arms crossed, I knew that I had a research project now. And for the first time in my life, the American government didn't officially issue it to me. This was a personal thing I had to find out. Both worlds felt real, but I knew that I had to get back to the Doctor and save the star whale while also clearing my name here.

Although the nausea from landing in this universe earlier had subsided, I still really did feel like I had a headache.

I narrowed my eyes at Meredith and Zodiac, but they still didn't look up. "Are you kidding me?" I tried, but they refused to look up from the polygraph machine and clipboards. "What am I here for? What did I do wrong?" I asked, but they still kept working and ignoring me, Zodiac typing away on a small tablet, and Meredith writing with her trusty pen that had some fluffy cotton-candy pink fuzz at the end, bouncing everywhere as she continued jotting things down.

I thought for a moment before moving from my spot against the wall and sitting in the chair across them on the other side of the table. I wasn't going to play the victim here, I was going to play the Area 51 researcher I was.

"Mer, how long was I gone?" I asked her, hoping that my nickname for her would catch her attention.

Thankfully, it did, and she looked up at me through the top of her bright pink square reading glasses. "So you know that you were gone?"

I gulped, looking into her eyes in fear. Meredith had always been the warm and playful girly older-sister type. She was shy, and about the sweetest girl I knew. Now she was really interrogating me with a cold look in her eyes that I've never seen before.

"I, ah-"

"Do not interrupt protocol, girls." Professor Zodiac interjected, before handing me the blood pressure cuff. I tilted my head at him as if to say, _seriously?_ and he sighed. "You were gone two hours. Now please, cooperate, Scarlette."

I stiffened a little at the mention of my old name, but took the pressure cuff anyway and wrapped it tight around my arm. If I was gone only two hours in this world, and nearly one day in the Doctor's world, then time must be moving faster over here. I needed to try and get back there, so I knew I had no time to waste. I had to work with them.

"What is your full name?" Meredith asked me. I knew that this was supposed to be the control variable, the test question, but I still felt like I was lying when I replied.

"Scarlette Rivera." I looked to the machine to see if it would beep, motioning I was lying, but the line remained still. I took a deep breath, and she continued with her questions.

"When is your date of birth?" She continued, sounding bored with the whole process already, as if it were just another day at the office. I guess that in retrospect it was, but at the same time, it isn't every day your best friend disappears after discovering an alien artifact. I could only imagine what I was going to hear from the other scientists. I tried to find the object myself to prove that I wasn't stupid, that I did know what I was talking about, and then I literally disappear.

"Scarlette!" Meredith yelled at me, and I jumped a little, snapped out of my thoughts. She almost never raised her voice, but I decided to just forget about it and answer.

"December 13th, 1989,"

"Ethnicity?"

"Puerto Rican American," I answered carefully. The machine wavered slightly as she looked away from it, but she didn't seem to count that as a lie. Of course, why in the world would I lie about my ethnicity? They all knew my father. I tried my best not to make it obvious that I was reading when she wrote, "nerves," down. What would the correct answer even be? Gallifreyan? Or was it all some type of hallucination? It felt wrong to think for even a second that I wasn't the daughter of a Puerto Rican father who married a Puerto Rican woman when he was young.

"Okay, now we are going to ask you some questions. Please respond with yes or no answers." Meredith told me. These sentences were ritual, and I could probably say it with her, but I had absolutely no idea what was coming next.

"Did you discover the recent artifact?"

"Yes."

"Did you discover your necklace along with the artifact?"

"No."

"Do you know where the necklace is?"

I eyed her carefully. I was literally wearing it right now, but they both stared at me expectantly, and not at all at the locket.

I controlled my breathing carefully. "No."

There was no beep from the machine.

**888**

In the 29th Century, the Doctor was standing on top of a chair to scan the light in the ceiling, which was actually a memory-wiping device.

"Yeah. Your basic memory-wipe job. Must have erased about 20 minutes." He recited, jumping to the floor.

Amy stood with her arms crossed. "But why would I choose to forget?"

"Because everyone does," Mandy pointed out from her spot in the doorway.

The Doctor walked up to her. "Did you?"

She eyed him strangely. This man was even weirder than the Scottish girl. "I'm not eligible to vote yet, I'm 12. Any time after you're 16, you're allowed to the see the film and make your choice. And then, once every five years..."

"And once every five years, everyone chooses to forget what they've learned. Democracy in action." The Doctor smiled, before turning back to Amy and grabbing her by the shoulders.

"Amy, you have to try to remember, where is Nova? Where did you last see her?" He asked her. 

Amy closed her eyes in concentration.

"You mean the American girl?" Mandy asked, still refusing to step into the voting booth.

"No— well, yes, the American girl. Amy, think!" The Doctor ordered. Amy only shook her head, and Mandy could tell they were both stressed over losing their friend.

"How do you not know about this? Are you Scottish too?" Mandy asked, distracting them for their sake.

The Doctor turned back to the monitors. "Oh, I'm way worse than Scottish. I can't even see the movie. Won't play for me."

"It played for me... although not for Nova." Amy added

"The difference being the computer doesn't accept us as human."

"Why not?" Amy asked, and the Doctor looked at her while she studied him. "You look human."

"No, you look Time Lord. We came first."

"So there are other Time Lords, yeah?"

The Doctor hung his head low. "No. There were, but there aren't..." The Doctor's expression shifted from one of remorse to slight anger. "Nova is the only other Time Lord in existence, and now she might be gone and it'll be... just me again. I can't let that happen."

Amy realized that he had been the last of his kind this entire time, and then Nova came around... and then she left. That must be absolutely awful. She wouldn't let him be alone, not again. "We'll find her." Amy promised him. "But... what happened?"

"Long story. There was a bad day. Bad stuff happened, and you know what? I'd love to forget it all, every last bit of it, but I don't. Not ever. Cause this is what I do— every time, every day, every second. This. Hold tight, we're bringing down the government!"

The Doctor pounded the protest button and the doors slammed shut, leaving Mandy outside. The Doctor and Amy backed up to the corner of the room as the floor beneath them slid open, and the smiler put on its angriest face.

"Say, 'Wheee!" The Doctor told Amy, raising his hands. All she could do was scream as they fell down the chute.

Outside the doors, a cloaked woman with a porcelain mask approached Mandy. She chuckled a little upon seeing Mandy so startled. "It's alright, love." She told her, removing her mask. "It's only me."

**888**

I was alone in the white interrogation room now as the door (which really just looked like part of the wall) beeped and slid open again.

"You're free to go, Ms. Rivera." Dylan smiled at me, entering the room. I stood up form my chair, walked up to him, and hugged him tight. I couldn't help it. He seemed so worried about me when I got back, and he literally welcomed me with open arms.

"Thank you," I told him, and he chuckled.

"Anyone could have come in here and told you you're free, Scarlette." I pulled back, but remained in his arms.

"No, not for that, for..." I took a deep breath. "Caring," I blurted, not knowing how else to put it. He seemed to be the only one around here who didn't think I did anything wrong, and for that I was thankful. Plus, he's also one of my best friends. Best friends are allowed to hug each other and have it be that simple.

This time he hugged me again. "Of course I care about you, Scarlie. But they care about you too, you know. They just have to do their job."

"I guess." I commented, pulling away and walking to the door, and out into the hallway, only for Dylan to catch up to me.

"Hey, you still have a job to do, you know."

"Is there a new mission?" I asked him.

"No, it's time for your physical now." he reminded me, grabbing my hand and pulling me into a different hallway I wasn't planning on going through.

My heart, or... maybe hearts, began fluttering, and I couldn't tell if it was because Dylan was now holding my hand (His hands are warm, unexpectedly warm! Best friends are allowed to hold hands, also), or because of the fact that I had _two_ hearts fluttering, and I knew there was no way to hide it from whoever was going to examine me.

**888**

The Doctor and Amy fell out of the chute with a scream into a dark red surrounding. The Doctor stood and began scanning around with his screwdriver while Amy laid in the sick. "High-speed air cannon," The Doctor remarked. "Lousy way to travel."

"Where are we?" Amy asked, with a face of disgust as she picked off... something, from her hand.

"600 feet down, 20 miles laterally— puts us at the heart of the ship. I'd say..." The Doctor sniffed. "Lancashire. What's this, then-- a cave? Can't be a cave. Looks like a cave."

Amy stood to join him. "It's a rubbish dump, and it's minging!" She complained, throwing another piece of gunk.

"Yes, but only food refuse!" The Doctor took a scrap and smelled it. "Organic, coming through feeder tubes from all over the ship."

Amy fell to her hands and knees. "The floor's all squidgy, like a water bed."

"But feeding what, though?"

"It's sort of rubbery, feel it! Wet and slimy." Amy cringed.

A loud and deep groaning sounded throughout the place, and the Doctor abruptly stood up, realizing where they were.

"Uh... It's not a floor, it's a..." The Doctor put his screwdriver away, searching for the right words.

Amy stood up again. "It's a what?"

"The next word is kind of a scary word. Take a moment." the Doctor tried, taking Amy's hands. "Get yourself in a calm place. Go ' _Ommm_...'" The Doctor began.

"Ommmm...?" Amy followed, hesitantly.

"It's a tongue."

"A tongue?"

The Doctor was excited now. "A tongue. A great big tongue!"

Amy was stunned as she turned, taking in her surroundings. She definitely wasn't excited, to say the least. "This is a mouth. This whole place is a mouth?" Amy turned back to the Doctor. "We're in a _mouth_!"

"Yes, yes, yes, but on the plus side, roomy." The Doctor tried. He couldn't help but imagine Nova being more excited if she were with him... She was so curious over the smallest details.

"How do we get out?!"

The Doctor pulled out his sonic again. "How big is this beastie? It's gorgeous! Blimey! If this is just the mouth, I'd love to see the stomach!" The creature rumbled, as if in response to him. "Though not right now..."

"Doctor, how do we get out?!" Amy questioned in distress.

The Doctor scanned again. "Okay, it's being fed through surgically implanted feeder tubes, so the normal entrance is..." He pointed his screwdriver towards the mouth of the creature, which was closed with ginormous and sharp teeth. "Closed for business," he added.

Amy began moving forward. "We can try, though."

The floor began rumbling. "No, stop, don't move!" everything only vibrated more, and they had trouble keeping their footing. "Too late. It's started."

"What has?"

"Swallow reflex!" The Doctor yelled in response, before they both fell to the slimy tongue again. The Doctor pulled out his screwdriver and began working it again.

"What are you doing?!" Amy shouted.

"I'm vibrating the chemo-receptors!" he called in response.

"Chemo-WHAT?!" Amy shouted again, falling after attempting to get up a second time.

"The eject button."

Amy finally stood up again. "How does a mouth have an eject button?"

"Think about it!"

They both looked out towards the throat in horror as a wave of... something, came rushing to them. "Right, then." The Doctor straightened his bow tie. "This isn't going to be big on dignity. Geronimo!"

**888**

Once again, I was sitting alone in a white room, but at least this time I wasn't a potential enemy of the US government or anything. Instead of a lone chair, I was sitting on a recliner in a nurse's office. I took my locket in my hand and observed it closely. It was strange... not only because of the fact that obviously, I seemed to jump to a different universe when I pushed the crystal, and that it made me Time Lord, but I couldn't remember it right. My whole life, having this locket, I just knew that my aunt gave it to me. Now that I really thought about it, I couldn't exactly remember my aunt giving it to me. It was just a fact. Like two and two is four, this locket is mine, because my aunt gave it to me.

This whole time, the only thing keeping me sane throughout being prodded and poked at, was the fact that maybe I could go back. If I just had enough alone time to where if I disappeared for a few hours and no one would question me, I could press the crystal and go back to the Doctor's world. I kept telling myself this, because I didn't want to think about the other option: That I was crazy and hallucinating; that I was so bored with this life that in my unconscious state, I'd cheat my way into dreaming an entirely different one. In doubt, I put my hand over my chest again.

There were still two heartbeats.

There's no way I could be hallucinating two heartbeats, right? It had to be real. This had to make sense. I was not crazy, and I definitely wasn't a failure. But if I wasn't crazy, and I wasn't a failure, than that would also mean... I wasn't human. And here I sat, waiting for someone to give me a medical exam as if I were.

Thankfully, when the door opened to reveal my blonde nurse, it was someone I knew. 

Unfortunately, it was also someone who I wasn't sure where I was at with right now.

Meredith held the door handle, not moving, and just staring at me, with her trusty clipboard still held securely in her other arm.

She sighed. "Of course they would," she muttered to herself, setting her things down on the counter. "The one time they let me take my eyes off a computer screen..." She trailed angrily, before pulling out her stethoscope and turning to me. She put it in her ears, holding up the end, going to put it towards my chest.

"No!" I yelled, backing up in the recliner. I wasn't sure what I was more terrified of-- finding out that I did have two hearts after all, or finding out that I didn't. Either way, I knew that it would be better if I was the only one who knew.

"Seriously, Scarlette?" Meredith retorted, trying to put the piece to my chest again, obviously still mad at me. I didn't want for her to be mad at me, of course, but I don't think it was the right time for me to tell her I'm not human. I was going to tell her, though, just... eventually.

"No, no!" I protested again. How was I going to stop her from checking my heartbeat? It was a basic thing. It was how all medical exams started. Really, I had no other choice, this time yanking the stethoscope from her ears.

Meredith gasped at me. "Scarlette! That is property of the United States government!"

I put the stethoscope behind me on the recliner, making sure that Meredith wouldn't try to take it back. Compared to me, she was a real sucker for the rules, and that was saying something. I'm not much of a rule-breaker myself, but Meredith was absolutely insistent on them. Although at the moment, I was counting on the fact that deep down, she was insistent on our friendship also.

"And you are my best friend, and I'm not having you mad at me any longer! What did I do?" I asked her, honestly not understanding why in the world she was angry with me. It's not like I _meant_ to disappear for two hours.

Meredith crossed her arms and gulped. "You... scared me," she quaked.

She sounded so weak when she said that, I knew that her cold looks before were a facade. "I—Really? How did I scare you?"

"I thought you were gone, Scarlette! You're my best friend, and I thought you left somewhere. When you came back, you know, you even looked a little bit different. You looked so tired, I thought you were someone else for a minute. Dylan noticed you right away, though."

I peered in the mirror behind her, almost having forgotten that even though I didn't change faces, I still went through a lot. Although I looked kind of the same, now that I was really staring at myself, I did look slightly exhausted.

" —And then I thought, what if _I_ was someone else to you? What if you were gone for a long time and I didn't know? How could any of us know, these things are alien! All of us here, we pretend like we know what we're talking about-- running tests on all these artifacts, but we don't! You should have seen Zodiac while you were gone. He knows the most out of everyone, and he was _still_ going insane! There's never a control variable. The only thing that's the same is the people we work with, and our friends." She told me, holding back the tears in her eyes.

I held her hands. "I don't know what happened, Mer, but I'm here now, and you're still my best friend," I stated, as vehemently as possible. It was true, while Dylan was also my best friend; Meredith was at the number one spot.

She nodded and wiped a tear from under her eye with her sleeve. She reached out to grab the stethoscope from behind me again, and I flinched back just a little. 

"Look, it's been a long day. So... why don't we just leave, and you can write some records and turn them in later." I told her, trying to pry her away from actually running any tests on me.

Meredith chuckled a little and nodded her head, and I stood and walked over to the door. I opened it and looked back one more time to see her looking recovered, writing away on her clipboard. "See you later, yeah?"

She eyed me for just a little, as if she was about to say something, but then nodded at me, so I closed the door behind me. Finally, I was free.

**888**

Amy woke up coughing in a narrow, bleak hallway to see the doctor examining the door in front of her.

"There's nothing broken, there's no sign of concussion, and yes, you are covered in sick."

"Where are we?" Amy managed to choke out.

"Overspill pipe, at a guess."

Amy stood up and realized that the hallway was rather pipe-shaped and rusty like the rest of the ship, before smelling something. "Oh, God, it stinks!"

"Ohh, that's not the pipe!" The Doctor commented from the doorway.

"Oh." Amy realized, smelling herself, finding that it was, in fact, coming from her. "Whoo! Can we get out?"

The Doctor spun to face her. "One door, one door switch, one condition, we forget everything we saw." The Doctor moved out of the way showing a 'Forget' button on the wall lighting up. "Look familiar? That's the carrot." On the other end of the hall, the lights flashed on and the Doctor and Amy noticed there were two smilers there. "Ooh, here's the stick." The Doctor found, walking towards the machines.

"There's a creature living in the heart of this ship. What's it doing there?" he asked the machines. The machines turned their heads to reveal their frown-faces in response. "No, that's not going to work on me, so come on. Big old beast below decks, and everyone who protests gets shoved down its throat. That how it works?" his voice went cold, "Is that what you did to her?" The machines turned their heads again, revealing their angriest face, with teeth showing and red eyes, but the Doctor was still unfazed. "Oh, stop it. I'm not leaving and I'm not forgetting until I find her. What are you fellows going to do about it? Stick out your tongues?"

The cases to the machines swung open like doors, and the smilers stood and began walking towards them in attack mode. 

Amy gasped in fear. "Doctor?"

Once again, the cloaked woman appeared, shooting the smilers down. She twirled her pistol and put it back in its holster.

The Doctor seemed slightly shocked. "Look who it is. You look a lot better without your mask."

She smiled and walked over to them. "You must be Amy. Liz," She introduced, shaking her hand. "Liz 10."

"Hi."

"Eurgh," Liz grimmaced, wiping her hand on her cloak. "Lovely hair, Amy. Shame about the sick. Is Nova in sick too? Where is she?"

"We don't know." the Doctor responded anxiously. "But we are going to find her."

"Oh, she didn't go back, did she?" Liz questioned sadly.

"Go back? Back where?" Amy asked her.

Just for a moment, a dumbstruck look flashed across Liz's face. She knew the legends, and she put all her faith in them, especially now that the Doctor was really in front of her. She assumed that he didn't know yet, just like her ancestors had predicted he wouldn't know at some point, and shrugged. She had hoped the man on the phone was just not seeing things. She had to cover up fast. "Oh, I don't know, seemed too bright to fall in sick."

"When did you meet her?" Amy asked Liz. She was with Nova the entire time, unless she saw her when they separated.

"You haven't met her though, have you? So how do you know about her?" The Doctor demanded.

Liz chose her words carefully, just as she was taught. "She's a legend, Doctor. Just like you."

"What legend?" the Doctor demanded again.

"The Supernova." A small voice replied, from behind Liz 10.

Liz put an arm around the little girl. "You know Mandy, yeah? She's very brave."

"How did you find us?" The Doctor wondered, calmer this time.

Liz threw a device to him. "Stuck my gizmo on you. Been listening in. Nice moves on the hurl escape. So, what's the big fella doing here?"

The Doctor examined the device. "You're over 16, you've voted. Whatever this is, you've chosen to forget about it."

"No. Never forgot, never voted. Not technically a British subject."

"Then who and what are you, and how do you know me? How did you know Nova?"

Liz smiled at him. "You're a bit hard to miss, love. Mysterious stranger, MO consistent with higher alien intelligence, Nova's got the glowing hair of a beauty queen, whilst you've hair of an idiot..." The Doctor pointed at her and ruffled his hair, only making Liz smile even more. "I've been brought up on the stories. My whole family was."

"Your family?" The Doctor questioned.

"Yeah." Liz responded, before noticing that the smilers were fidgeting, slowly bringing themselves back to life. "They're repairing. Doesn't take them long. Let's move."

Liz led the way and began explaining as they followed her around. "The Doctor. Old drinking buddy of Henry XII. Tea and scones with Liz II. Vicky was a bit on the fence about you, weren't she? Knighted and exiled you on the same day. Oh, and Nova with Henry the 8th, what a charmer she is!"

The Doctor almost smiled a bit, knowing that this meant Nova would stay with him longer. Even though time could be rewritten, there was still hope. About Henry the 8th, though... "Liz 10?" he asked her.

Some smilers rose up to attack from behind them. "Liz 10, yeah. Elizabeth X. And down!" She commanded, shooting the smilers down as Amy, The Doctor, and Mandy ducked. They stared up at her in awe while she held her pistols in each hand. "I'm the bloody Queen, mate. Basically, I rule."

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> t was 2014 and i was going through my taylor swift phase when i wrote this if anyone's noticed. edited 3/24/17


	7. The Beast Below (pt 3) Area 51 (pt 3)

The 10th Queen of England led Amy, the Doctor, and Mandy through another basement of the ship. "There's a high-speed Vator through there." She told them, though the Doctor walked straight up to the cage that seemed to be containing something living. They were the two stingers that Amy recognized from inside the tent earlier, banging at the walls. "Oh, yeah. There's these things. Any ideas?" The Queen asked him.

"Doctor, I saw one of these up top with Nova. There was a hole in the road, like it had burst through, like a root." Amy told the Doctor, looking at the tentacle-like arms closer.

The Doctor studied it. "Exactly like a root. It's all one creature-- the same one we were inside-- reaching out. It must be growing through the mechanisms of the entire ship."

"What, like an infestation?" Liz 10 asked. The Doctor nodded. "Someone's helping it, feeding it." She realized in anger, walking down the hall again. "Feeding my subjects to it! Come on. We've got to keep moving."

The Queen and Mandy stormed off, but the Doctor put his hands on the cage.

"Doctor?" Amy asked in concern.

He couldn't take his eyes of the creature. "Oh, Amy. We should never have come here."

**888**

The grey-haired man watched as the Doctor, the Queen, Amy, and Mandy ventured across his screen, and spoke into his microphone. "Winder division one. Ten has penetrated to the lower levels. Initiate the protocol."

**888**

The Doctor, now clean, walked around the glasses on the floor carefully, trying not to knock them over. "Why all the glasses?"

"To remind me every single day that my government is up to something, and it's my duty to find out what." Liz 10 responded from her bed.

The Doctor grabbed her mask and observed it closely. "A queen going undercover to investigate her own kingdom?"

The Queen leaned forward intensely. "Secrets are being kept from me. I don't have a choice. Ten years I've been at this-− my entire reign-− and you've achieved more in one afternoon."

Amy came out from the back, clean now also, and the Doctor began pacing. "How old were you when you came to the throne?"

"40. Why?"

Amy finished putting her hair up in a bun in the mirror in front of her and looked to the Queen. "What, you're 50 now? No way!" Amy moved to sit on the chaise at the foot of her bed with Mandy.

"Yeah, they slowed my body clock. Keeps me looking like the stamps."

The Doctor sat on the bed with her. "And you always wear this in public?"

"Undercover's not easy when you're me. The autographs, the bunting."

The Doctor looked closely at her face, and then back to the mask. "Air-balanced porcelain. Stays on by itself, cause it's perfectly sculpted to your face."

"Yeah, so what?" she asked defensively.

"Oh, Liz. So everything."

The door slammed open then, and a group of hooded men with gold amulets walked in that Amy recognized from before. The Doctor stood to face them, while the queen was outraged. "What are you doing? How dare you come in here!"

The main hooded man was completely calm as he responded. "Ma'am, you have expressed interest in the interior workings of Starship UK. You will come with us now."

Liz stood up now too. "Why would I do that?"

In response, the man rotated his head slowly, and on the back of his head was a smiler in its angriest state that seemed to be bolted to the back of his skull.

"How can they be smilers?" Amy asked the Doctor.

"Half smiler, half human." the Doctor noted.

Liz 10 showed no fear, and walked up to the smiler-human. "Whatever you creatures are, I am still your Queen. On whose authority is this being done?"

"The highest authority, ma'am." The smiler-human responded in its robotic voice.

"I _am_  the highest authority!"

"Yes ma'am. You must go now ma'am."

"Where?"

"The tower, ma'am."

**888**

Finally, I was sitting in a transportation car that the employees used to get to and from the workplace. It looked like a pretty normal car, a simple red convertible, and I got in the passenger seat. I handed the driver my worker identification card, and with one look, he knew where to start driving to take me to my apartment.

Area 51 employees weren't allowed to have their own vehicles, because they were too easy to track. Instead, we had other people always driving us around, or we car-pooled in a company car. But usually, people were driving us around. Of course, these people weren't so ready for hire. Usually, they were retired 51 employees, sometimes CIA if we're desperate. So when the man saw my nervous state, he understood.

"Rough day?" he asked me, as I fidgeted with my locket. "You have no idea." I responded, and he laughed and started the car. "I'd really like to get home quickly, if you don't mind."

The man smiled at me and turned on a special setting on the car that was alien tech we adopted. As soon as he turned it on, we were transported to a location closer to my house. "No problem, darling."

**888**

Amy, Mandy, Liz 10 and the Doctor entered the tower behind the smiler. Amy walked ahead to a grating to see more of the stinging creatures trapped in it. "Doctor, where are we?"

"The lowest point of Starship UK." he held out his arms and spun around unenthusiastically. "The dungeon."

"Ma'am." The grey-haired man respected, approaching Liz 10.

"Hawthorne! So this is where you hid yourself away. I think you've got some explaining to do," she responded, only a bit less harsh than she probably should have been.

"There's children down here, what's that all about?" The Doctor asked, ruffling a boy's hair as a group of children walked by in a straight line.

"Protesters and citizens of limited value are fed to the beast. For some reason, it won't eat the children. You're the first adults it's spared. You're very lucky." Hawthorne explained.

The Doctor was angry now. "Yeah, look at us. Torture chamber of the Tower of London. Lucky, lucky, lucky. Except it's not a torture chamber, is it?" He walked over to examine the equipment. "Well, except it is. Except it isn't. Depends on your angle."

The Doctor walked over to Liz, where she was looking down an open well. Inside it seemed to be a live organ.

"What's that?" Liz demanded.

"Well, like I say, depends on the angle. It's either the exposed pain center of big fella's brain, being tortured relentlessly..." He rambled angrily.

"Or?" The queen asked.

"Or it's the gas pedal, the accelerator-- Starship UK's go-faster button."

Liz shook her head. "I don't understand."

"Don't you? Try, go on. The spaceship that could never fly, no vibration on deck. This creature-- this poor, trapped, terrified creature. It's not infesting you, it's not invading-- it's what you have instead of an engine. And this place down here is where you hurt it, where you torture it, day after day, just to keep it moving." They looked at the brain in the well in remorse as electrical surges tasered it, and a creature's painful rumble could be heard faintly.

"Tell you what," The Doctor began, walking over to the grating and lifting it up, the stinger rising freely. "Normally it's above the range of human hearing. This is the sound none of you wanted to hear." The Doctor pulled out his sonic and pointed it at the creature, amplifying the sound. Everyone in the room could hear it roaring in pain.

"Stop it!" The Queen ordered, and they all looked on the creature sadly, while she turned back to Hawthorne. "Who did this?"

"We act on instructions from the highest authority." He responded calmly.

"I am the highest authority. The creature will be released, now. I said now!" She shouted. Around the room, everyone stood frozen, not moving a muscle. "Is anyone listening to me?!"

The Doctor was holding her mask. "Liz. Your mask."

"What about my mask?"

He threw it to her. "Look at it. It's old. At least 200 years old, I'd say."

"It's an antique, so?"

"Yeah, an antique made by craftsmen over 200 years ago and perfectly sculpted to your face. They slowed your body clock, all right, but you're not 50. Nearer 300. And it's been a long old reign."

"Nah, it's ten years. I've been on this throne ten years!" Liz tried to explain.

"Ten years. And the same ten years over and over again, always leading you..." The Doctor led her over to where a small voting monitor was, much like the one Amy and Nova had faced. Only, instead of the buttons ' _protest_ ', ' _forget_ ', and ' _record_ ', there were only two, and they read ' _forget_ ', and ' _abdicate_ '. "There."

The Queen looked down at the buttons in horror before slowly turning to Hawthorne. "What have you done?"

"Only what you have ordered. We work for you, Ma'am. The Winders, the Smilers, all of us." he finished, turning on the monitor to a video of the Queen, Liz 10 herself.

"If you are watching this... If I am watching this, then I have found my way to the Tower Of London." The real Liz 10 sat in front of the monitor, listening intently as the image of a creature came on the screen. "The creature you are looking at is called a Star Whale. Once, there were millions of them. They lived in the depths of space and, according to legend, guided the early space travelers through the asteroid belts. This one, as far as we are aware, is the last of its kind. And what we have done to it breaks my heart." The Doctor looked down from the screen, relating all too much, while Amy and Mandy stared at the screen in silence.

"The Earth was burning. Our sun had turned on us, and every other nation had fled to the skies. Our children screamed as the skies grew hotter. And then it came, like a miracle. The last of the star whales. We trapped it, we built our ship around it, and we rode on its back to safety. If you wish our voyage to continue, then you must press the 'forget' button. Be again the heart of this nation, untainted. If not, press the other button. Your reign will end, the Star Whale will be released, and our ship will disintegrate. I hope I keep the strength to make the right decision."

"I voted for this?" Amy asked herself as the video paused. "Why would I do that?"

The Doctor finally turned to her. "Because you knew if we stayed here, I'd be faced with an impossible choice. Humanity or the alien. You took it upon yourself to save me from that. And that was wrong. You don't _ever_ decide what I need to know," he scolded, in a low, harsh voice.

"But I don't even remember doing it!" Amy protested.

"But you did it, that's what counts." he glared at her.

"I'm... I'm sorry." Amy stuttered.

"Oh, I don't care! When I'm done here, you're going home." The Doctor finished, walking away to the controls.

Amy wouldn't back down. "Why? Because I made a mistake? _One_ mistake? I don't even remember doing it. Doctor!"

"Yeah, I know, you're only human." He mocked, fiddling with the controls.

"What are you doing?" Liz 10 asked, her voice cracking.

The Doctor sighed and continued working at the controls, not daring to look up at her. "The worst thing I'll ever do. I'm going to pass a massive electrical charge through the Star Whale's brain. Should knock out all its higher functions, leave it a vegetable. The ship will still fly, but the whale won't feel it."

"But that'll be like killing it," Amy observed numbly.

The Doctor looked to them in frustration. "Look, three options. One: I let the Star Whale continue in unendurable agony for hundreds more years. Two: I kill everyone on this ship. Three: I murder a beautiful, innocent creature as painlessly as I can." He scratched his head and looked back to the controls. "And then I find a new name, because I won't be the Doctor any more."

"There must be something we can do, some other way." Liz 10 hoped.

"Nobody talk to me. Nobody HUMAN, HAS ANYTHING TO SAY TO ME TODAY!" The Doctor yelled harshly, making the girls jump back.

**888**

I had my keys ready in hand as I ran up my apartment stairs. Why did I have to live on the third floor?! Why did my father let me choose the third floor when I moved here? Even though the apartment complex was fairly new and modern, the stairs were still faster than the elevator. I practically ran into my apartment door as I jammed my keys in the lock and turned them. As soon as my feet made contact with the hardwood floors, I slammed the door behind me, locked it, reached up to the crystal on my necklace and pressed it.

I didn't have time to think about theories or what I was planning on doing next, because it worked. It worked, and before I knew it, I was surrounded by light again.

"Nobody talk to me. Nobody HUMAN, HAS ANYTHING TO SAY TO ME TODAY!" I head a voice yell as I landed, and I remembered exactly what was happening and exactly who said that line.

I materialized a few feet away from the Doctor and noticed that I was back... forward, in the 29th century, in the dungeons of Starship UK. Unfortunately, that was all I had the strength to notice as I stumbled into the Doctor's arms with a pounding headache.

"Good thing I'm not human, then." I breathed, as I closed my eyes and raised a hand to my forehead. I could only assume that the headaches I've gotten recently were a side affect of traveling between dimensions, because I didn't really get very sick that often.

"Nova!" Amy yelled, as he caught me.

Aside from the stumble, I was still standing fine as my headache slowly subsided. "Nova, where were you?" The Doctor asked me worriedly as he let me go. I looked at him for a few moments before looking to my left to see the Tenth Queen Of England, and then slowly spun all the way around to completely soak in my surroundings. The technology surrounded us looked both old and new at the same time.

"I was..." I tried explaining, still staring around trying to process everything once again, until I felt someone grab my hand. I looked to see it was the grey-haired man who was shaking it.

"Nova, such a pleasure to meet you!" He rushed. "I knew you'd come, didn't have a doubt, especially after that little signal." He told me excitedly.

I was taken aback by how the man seemed to be talking to me as if he were a fan. "What signal?"

"The wink!" he cheered. "I knew you would know what to do when you winked at one of our winders."

I nodded. "Right! I do... know what to do." I said, hesitantly. I did know what to do, but I had no idea how he knew this. I also still wasn't completely sure if I wanted to let everyone else know that I knew what to do.

"I'm sorry, I'm not catching on," The Doctor said. "YOU know what to do here? How can you possibly know what to do here! Do you even know what's at stake?" He asked me.

"Yes, there's the last star whale being tortured to keep the ship running, I know!" I rushed, as Mandy walked up to us with Timmy. It was stupid to say, but I couldn't think straight. My headache finally subsided, so when I realized what I had said, it was already too late. I had to come clean.

"How did you know that?" Amy asked me.

"Because I−" I choked, not being able to finish the sentence as I started violently gasping for air. It felt like someone punched my lungs as I became dizzier, and images of Prisoner Zero flashed through my mind.

"How?!" The Doctor asked again. I tried to get the words out, _because I know everything that's going to happen_ , but every time I took a breath to say it again, Prisoner Zero's threat flickered through my mind as if someone was forcing me to think about it, forcing me to not say it, and I quickly realized that someone was. I hated to think that the worm-like multi-form alien was completely serious when it threatened me, but it was true.

"Because she teleported from the camera room. The headaches, the asthma-- it's a side effect." Liz 10 told the Doctor matter-of-factly.

I had no idea where that explanation came from or how the Queen of England from the future could have made it up, but I knew it was probably the most that the Doctor could know without me dying, so I nodded. As soon as he heard that explanation, everything seemed to snap into place for him, and he changed his demeanor when he realized I was still in a state.

"Nova," The Doctor said calmly, cupping my face gently in his hands. "Breathe, breathe." he coaxed me, and slowly my breathing returned to normal. "Amy, go sit with her." He told Amy, as she put an arm around my shoulder and began walking me to the wall. "I have to do this." The Doctor said, turning to the controls.

"No, no!" I yelled, turning to Amy. "Amy, think about it. The Doctor never interferes with planets or people unless there's..." I trailed off, motioning to Mandy and Timmy who were petting a part of the Star Whale that was coming out from a grate.

"Children crying!" Amy finished, understanding what I was getting at. She ran to the Doctor who was working the controls. "Doctor, whatever you're doing, stop it now!"

He didn't stop fumbling with the wires. "Why?"

"Because Nova knows how to fix this, and I do too!" Amy told him. She seemed to have taken the job of distracting and stopping him, so I moved over to the Queen.

"Yes we do!" I yelled, back to good health. "Sorry, we're gonna need your hand." I said, taking the Queen's hand and walking over to the monitor. "Prepare yourselves!" I shouted again, as I slammed her hand down on the 'abdicate' button on the monitor.

"NO!" The Doctor yelled, running over to us, but it was too late.

The lights flickered and things fell over as the ship rocked a little, with the creature managing it getting used to painlessness. We all fell down a little, until the lights came back on again.

The Doctor got up first. "Girls, what have you done?"

Amy stood up carefully. "Nothing at all, am I right?"

A sonic whirring could be heard throughout the room going higher and higher as the lights became brighter along with it. "We've increased speed!" Hawthorne observed, looking at the monitors.

"Well yeah, you've stopped torturing the pilot!" I jabbed, but a small smile escaped.

"It's still here," the Queen marveled, looking at the Star Whale brain through the well. "I don't understand."

Amy smiled as she walked up to the Queen and began explaining. "The Star Whale didn't come like a miracle all those years ago. It _volunteered_. You didn't have to trap it or torture it− that was all just you. It came because it couldn't stand to watch your children cry."

"Exactly!" I confirmed, standing next to Amy.

Amy smiled. "Yeah, because... what if you were really old, and really kind and alone? Your whole race dead, no future. If you were that old, and that kind, and the very last of your kind... " She trailed, looking to the Doctor. "You couldn't just stand there and watch children cry."

The Doctor bowed his head, while Mandy came over to me with Timmy by her side. "Thank you," she told me shyly.

I smiled at her. "No problem, Mandy." She gave me a small smile back, and I waved at Timmy before they walked away, and I found myself go still again as I recalled another moment from my old life.

**888**

_"Okay," I told the children as they piled behind me into the tunnel. I moved backwards to make room for them, while being able to face them so they would hear me. I knew they would anyway, because all of them were completely silent, as if they were afraid something would get them if they made a sound. I took a deep breath and spoke loudly anyway. "Listen up. I have to go back out there, but this tunnel right here, keep going straight, all the way through, until you see light again. Then you should be out on the fields. There are plenty of nice farmers out there who would definitely be willing to take care of you. I gave them extra seeds and money. You'll be alright."_

_They were all silent, until one of the older girls moved to the front of the group. "Just keep going straight? How do you know it's safe?" She questioned._

_"I've been through here before." I told her, not wanting to reveal too much about how exactly I found this tunnel. If I let them know that, then they definitely wouldn't trust me anymore. All I wanted was for them to be safe, and as I looked at all their muddy, bruised, and scared faces, I knew it for certain. They didn't deserve this._

_The girl continued to stare at me for a few moments, as if trying to see if I would flinch under pressure, but then looked straight ahead into the tunnel. She_ _nodded. "Okay."_

_I didn't blame the children for not thanking me, or not even showing any sign of relief at all. They had seen a lot out there, none of which they should have seen in their entire lives. I moved out of the way and pressed myself against the wet rock wall, and off they went through the tunnel. There must have been about thirty of them this time, some running, some walking cautiously, and a few helping the injured. They continued straight on, until at the end of the line, one little boy turned back, and gave me the smallest hint of a smile._

_I smiled back, and I knew they would be okay._

**888**

"Nova... Nova!" Amy yelled at me, shaking my shoulders.

I blinked at her, and it took me a few moments to realize I was now sitting on the floor. "Amy? Wait... how did I get here."

The Doctor and Amy were on the floor, on either side of me, and a few others seemed to be staring at me. The others seemed to be okay now, and continued on with whatever they were doing, while Amy gave a small laugh. "You just... froze. I've been yelling for minutes."

I furrowed my eyebrows and thought about what I had just remembered. It was definitely a memory from Gallifrey, a memory of war. "Really?"

"Nova, what was that?" The Doctor asked me.

"I remembered. I remember pieces of my old life from Gallifrey, and, I don't know, I kind of just forgot about real life," I said cautiously, almost afraid of what he would think, but he smiled faintly, and pulled out his sonic to begin scanning me.

"What do you remember?"

"Just, um, helping children," I hesitated, "in the... war." I looked down and he flicked his sonic up, finishing his scanning

He looked at me softly in understanding, before looking at the readings from his sonic. "Hmm, funny. It's almost like psychological repression, except it wiped out your entire life. And now it's slowly coming back to you," he stood up, really getting into an explaining mood. "But the memories of a Time Lord are a bit more powerful than human memories, so when you remember them, you... freeze."

"Wait, hold on, psycho-what?" Amy asked, not keeping up.

"Psychological repression. It's when you unconsciously forget something traumatic that happens, because it's too much to bear."

"Okay... I think I get it," Amy nodded slowly.

"Good, well, forget that, because it's not really like that at all," he turned to me, "It's not like your brain made you forget... it's like something else did."

I nodded, a little more worried now. Someone, or something, was trying to make me forget my past life. How is that even possible? I knew that Prisoner Zero claimed to have somehow psychologically implanted itself in my brain, but how does that even work? Maybe since it could read minds, it was kind of like installing a program on a computer.

I ran through theories in my mind. Could it have been Prisoner Zero? The Silence? Why would they want me to forget, anyway? What was it that was so dangerous I couldn't remember it? I bit my lip both nervously, and in thought. "So... someone is trying to make me forget life on Gallifrey."

"Yes," he sighed. "Nova, every time you remember something, I need you to tell me. We'll figure it out," he assured me. "Alright?"

"Okay," I agreed, hoping I would always be willing.

**888**

I walked out onto the observation deck where I saw the Doctor standing there alone, looking out to the Starship. "Hey."

He turned to me, and I smiled as Amy walked up to us on his other side, handing him a mask. "From Her Majesty. She says there will be no more secrets on Starship UK."

"Amy..." he started, before turning to me. "Nova, you could have killed everyone on this ship."

Once again, I really felt like I was cheating. I couldn't help but wonder if I would have come to that conclusion by myself, let alone be brave enough to hit the button if I hadn't watched the show. It seemed like I had no other choice other than to give myself the benefit of the doubt. "You're right, and I would never do that." Or at least, I really hoped. "But I would also never kill a Star Whale." I told him.

"Yeah, and you could have killed it." Amy told him.

"And you saved it, I know, I know." He nodded.

"Amazing, though, don't you think? The Star Whale. All that pain and misery... and loneliness. And it just made it kind." Amy told him, looking at him sideways. Amy came to the conclusion because she saw it herself—she saw it in the Doctor.

"But you couldn't have known how it would react," the Doctor told her.

"You couldn't. But we could. Right, Nova?" Amy looked to me.

"Yeah, we've seen it before. Very old, very kind, very last... but, there's something you need to know." I told the Doctor.

"What?" he asked me.

Slowly, I reached for his hand and held it in mine. My hands were smaller than his, but they fit perfectly together. He didn't move at first, a little confused, until I looked up at him. "You're not alone anymore." I spoke softly, seeing a small smile creep up on his face as he pulled me into a tight hug. I hugged him back, finally in good health while in his warm embrace for once.

"Hey, Doctor?" Amy called from behind me.

"What?" he let go of me and looked at her.

"Gotcha," she smirked.

He put an arm around her shoulder, and the other around mine. "Ha!" he squeezed Amy tight to his side. "Gotcha."

**888**

All three of us were back in the marketplace, walking to the TARDIS.

"Shouldn't we say goodbye? Won't they wonder where we went?" Amy asked, as we walked down the... pavement? Sidewalk, street? What do they call these things on spaceships, anyway?

"For the rest of their lives. Oh, the songs they'll write! Never mind them. Big day tomorrow!" The Doctor said excitedly, walking up to the TARDIS doors.

"Sorry, what?" Amy asked, and I knew she was thinking about her wedding.

"It's always a big day tomorrow. We've got a time machine. I skip the little ones." The Doctor explained, unlocking the door.

"You know what I said about getting back for tomorrow morning?" Amy started. I stood in front of her also. "Have you ever run away from something because you were scared, or not ready, or just... Just because you could?"

"Um, I think that's kind of what he's doing right now." I told her, and the Doctor smiled.

A phone started ringing as Amy continued talking. "Right. Doctor, there's something I haven't told you. No. Hang on, is that a phone ringing?"

"Oh, me too! I need to tell you something too." I remembered, obviously needing to figure out how to explain the whole jumping-universe thing at some point.

We all walked in the TARDIS. "Can I answer it?" I asked excitedly, knowing who it was.

"Of course," the Doctor smiled at me, and I grinned as I picked up the phone, Amy standing close behind me to hear it also.

"Hello!" I answered enthusiastically.

"Yes, Prime Minister here." I heard Winston Churchill say.

Well that's not a sentence you hear every day, nor a sentence I ever thought I would hear. "He says he's the Prime Minister!" Amy whispered to the Doctor, who was working the controls on the console hearing our conversation.

"Which Prime Minister?" He asked me, motioning for Amy to pull a lever.

"Oh yeah, duh." I said sarcastically, more to myself, before realizing that was probably not the right thing to say to any British Prime Minister. "Sorry! I mean, which one?"

"Why, the British one of course!" I heard him grumble.

"Which British one?" I asked, as if I didn't already know the answer.

"Winston Churchill." he replied sternly, as if giving an order.

I pulled the phone away from my ear slowly, biting my lip to keep from grinning like a maniac. I actually just had a conversation with...

"Who is it?" The Doctor asked me.

"Uh, Winston Churchill." He took the phone from me while I turned to Amy and mouthed, 'Oh My God!' and she beamed at me.

"Oh! Hello, dear. What's up?" He said into the phone. I couldn't hear what Winston was saying, but it wasn't too soon until the Doctor replied, "Don't worry about a thing, Prime Minister. We're on our way."

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> for the record, winston churchill was a racist sexist jerk irl, but not in the whoniverse! has anyone seen the crown? 


	8. Victory of the Daleks (pt 1)

It was 1944 in a secret underground war room. It was smoky, and men and women in RAF uniforms were crowded all around the table speaking urgently into headsets, trying to keep track of the war going on above, and trying to win it.

It was easier to do when you didn't know anyone, to pretend like the little dots on the radar were just that-- little dots, and nothing more. But to Breen, who was pressing her headset to her ear so hard she thought her ear might be bruised by now, there was one little dot on the radar that meant the world to her- one little dot that resembled the love of her life, flying and fighting to the death.

"If wishes were kisses," she sighed into her headset, hoping for dear life that he was okay, because that was all she could do, besides communicating the same codes over and over. "Hostile 36, confirm, please." She continued, doing her job. After all, she was still quite lucky that she got to take a part in the war. Girls only started being able to help when they were desperate for it, and Breen was more than ready to do as much as she could.

But everything was easier said than done.

Another woman walked into the room with an announcement. "26 and 41 detailed to intercept."

"41?" Breen asked, fearing that she was hearing right. "But that's Reg's squadron." The woman gave her an apologetic look, until the man himself stepped in the room, and everyone stood straight as they could, alert. "Sir."

"How many?" Winston Churchill asked the crew.

"Looks like a dozen Heinkel at least, sir. With Messerschmidts flanking." A male officer responded.

"Out of range?" Winston asked.

"Normally, sir, yes." Breen responded eagerly, but there was a worry that could be heard behind her voice. Winston glanced at her for just a moment, but it was a war, after all. Who wasn't worried?

"Well, then," Winston puffed his cigar, "Time to roll out the secret weapon!"

Breen nodded with a smile. She was excited for the weapon, she really thought it could help win the war... and bring Reg back safe. She pulled out a long stick and pushed the figure of the weapon across the map.

Little did Breen know, that weapon was a Dalek.

**888**

Winston Churchill was writing away in his dark, smoky office, when a buzzer sounded. He took off his glasses and smiled, knowing who it must be.

**888**

The Doctor opened the TARDIS doors and stepped out, and I heard the sound of rifles being reloaded and pointed at him. "Nova, Amy..." We stepped out also and saw him holding his arms out in introduction, "Winston Churchill."

"Doctor? Is it you?" Winston asked him, while I just wearily stared at the guns being pointed at us by the three soldiers. Even if I knew I wasn't actually going to get shot, and if I did, I would probably just regenerate... being held at gunpoint still felt uncomfortable. I was also still trying to process the fact that I was here in the first place at the same time.

"Oh, Winston, my old friend!" The Doctor greeted, going to shake his hand-- but Winston turned his hand outward, motioning for him to give him something. "Ahhh, every time!" The Doctor pointed at him.

"What's he after?" Amy asked the Doctor.

"TARDIS key, of course."

"Think of what I could achieve with your remarkable machine, Doctor! The lives that could be saved!" Winston Churchill declared, trying to convince the Doctor to let him use the TARDIS for the war.

The Doctor went back and closed the doors, looking them. "Ah, doesn't work like that."

"Must I take it by force?" Winston asked firmly.

"I'd like to see you try." The Doctor challenged, only a hint of playfulness could be heard in his voice.

"At ease." Winston commanded his soldiers, who put their guns down.

"You rang?" The Doctor asked, as Winston began leading us through the halls.

**888**

"So you've changed your face, again." Winston observed.

"Yeah, well, had a bit of work done," The Doctor replied.

"Got it, got it, got it! Cabinet War Rooms, right?" Amy guessed.

"Yup. Top secret heart of the War Office, right under London." The Doctor pointed to the ceiling.

"Cool," I smiled. I was always a fan of all the new inventions made during World War II.... Though now that I thought of it, there were some other inventions around here that weren't supposed to be made.

"You're late, by the way." Churchill told him. The Doctor looked at his watch closely, while a woman in uniform came up to Winston with a clipboard and pen.

"Requisitions, sir." She told him, and I suddenly remembered that her name was Breen. It was a peculiar name to me. It's so close to green. Green Breen. Almost like Green Bean.

"Excellent," He responded to her, taking the board and pen. She looked so official, everyone around here looked so official—and here I was calling her a green bean in my head... I had to admit I was nervous for what I knew would happen.

"Late?" The Doctor wondered.

"I rang you a month ago," Winston told him, signing the papers.

"Really? Sorry. Sorry, it's a Type 40 TARDIS. I'm just running her in." The Doctor apologized, as if any of us knew what Type 40 TARDIS meant. We came to a stop as Winston handed the clipboard back to Breen, noticing her a little off, and I knew why. I felt so bad for the girl. I knew what it was like to lose someone in a war, even if I didn't completely remember it.

"Something the matter, Breen? You look a little down in the dumps." Winston asked her.

She made a slight gasp that was so small and quiet I was sure I was the only one who heard it, as she hugged the clipboard and shook her head. "No, sir. Fine, sir."

"Action this day, Breen! Action this day!" Winston encouraged her, as she forced a smile.

"Yes, sir." She nodded. She glanced to Amy, and then to me, and I gave her an apologetic smile.

Before she moved to walk away, I grabbed her arm suddenly and leaned forward to whisper in her ear. "I'm sorry, Breen. But you're doing so great. You're so strong, just like he would want you to be right now."

It seems I was always doing that now, to Mandy, and now to Breen. Whispering secret words of encouragement that no one else could hear. Maybe sometimes, just a small, encouraging whisper could change things for the better, even if it wasn't much. I knew that for certain as I pulled back and she gave me a small look of wonder and empathy. "Thank you so much, ma'am. Truly." She told me, smiling a little, real smile, before turning back around with her head held high.

I smiled at her as she walked away. I knew she was going to do good work for her country.

"What did you say to her, darling? She seemed so inspired." Winston Churchill asked me.

I opened my mouth a little, but then closed it and shook my head with a smile, deciding it was probably better if he didn't know. "I just reminded her of something."

A male officer came up to us just then. "Excuse me, sir, got another formation coming in, Prime Minister. Stukas, by the look of them."

"We shall go up top then, Group Captain! We'll give 'em what for!" Winston said, swinging a closed fist in motivation. "Coming, Doctor?"

"Why?" The Doctor asked him. Winston snatched back his cane that the Doctor had tucked under his arm.

"I have something to show you."

Winston walked in front of us, and the Doctor turned to Amy and I and mouthed an 'ooh,' while I smiled and Amy giggled.

We followed Winston again, and the Doctor walked closely next to me. "What did you say to Breen?" The Doctor asked me.

"Couldn't you tell?" I looked to him. "She lost someone, but she's really brave."

His eyes turned soft and he smiled at me slightly.

Soon enough, we were in an elevator. I was in the back with Amy while the Doctor stood next to Winston, waving the smoke away from the cigar he was puffing.

"We stand at a crossroads, Doctor. Quite alone, with our backs to the wall. Invasion is expected daily. So I will grasp with both hands anything that will give us an advantage over the Nazi menace." Winston told him, charismatically.

The Doctor turned back to Amy and I for just a moment, before asking Winston, "Such as?"

The lift stopped and Winston opened the gate. "Follow me," he told us, going up the steps and opening the door to the roof. We followed him out, and I noticed that amidst the sandbags on the roof, a man in a white coat stood watching the sky with binoculars. I remembered the inventions again, and I knew that the man in the white coat wasn't any ordinary man, even though he thought and felt like he was.

"Doctor, this is Professor Edwin Bracewell, head of our Ironsides Project." Winston introduced, pointing to the man on the higher level.

The Doctor held up his hand in a 'V' for victory, which really just looked like a peace sign to me, while Bracewell waved at us. "How d'you do?"

I walked closer to the edge of the roof next to the Doctor, and then Amy, who was on his other side. We looked out onto the war-torn city in front of us, and I jumped a little at an explosion. I felt numb, looking out at the scene. I know I had seen something like it before. Amy hadn't, though, and she was heartbroken. "Oh, Doctor... Doctor, it's..."

"History." He sighed.

"Ready, Bracewell?" Winston asked him.

"Aye-aye, sir!" he responded, still staring out through his binoculars, giving a thumbs-up. "On my order, fire!" He commanded, and laser beams shot up to the sky in response, destroying the enemy planes in the sky.

"What was that?" Amy asked us in shock. Laser beams weren't very 1940s.

I furrowed my brows, and without thinking of what I remembered, I immediately ran up the ladder, already a step ahead of the Doctor again. I passed by a tall pile of sandbags and slowly looked to the left to see a dark green dalek there, painted like a British soldier. Daleks always looked funny to me, but for some reason, right here, right now, staring into the face of one and knowing that this universe was real, I was completely terrified. Something from my crystal necklace heated up, and I felt a fear I've never felt before, not even while I went on my own mission alone. Once again, I felt like a Time Lord, and along with that, I felt the need to murder the metal in front of me, but was too terrified to move.

"That wasn't human, that was never human technology. That sounded like..." The Doctor trailed, and I knew that he finally recognized the beams. "Show me! Show me what that was!" I heard the Doctor frantically yelling to Bracewell as he stepped up the ladder.

"Advance!" Bracewell commanded it. "Our new secret weapon!" Churchill yelled from below. Suddenly, the dalek began moving towards me and I snapped out of my trance, quickly walking backwards in fear.

I ran right into the Doctor behind me, but I didn't care. Thankfully, he caught me by the waist. "No, no..." I whispered quietly, though I was sure the Doctor could hear me. Why was I so terrified of these stupid things? They looked like saltshakers!

"What do you think? Quite something, eh?" Winston yelled from below. The Doctor gently placed his hands on my shoulders from behind me and I moved a little to the side, letting the Doctor walk right up to the dalek, facing it eye to... eyestalk. How did I know it was called an eyestalk?

"What are you doing here?" The Doctor asked darkly.

"I am your. Soldier." The dalek replied in its usual monotone, but definitely not its usual choice of words.

"What?" The Doctor asked again, not registering a dalek that didn't immediately threaten him.

"I am your soldier." It replied again.

Even standing behind the Doctor, I knew the fury was growing in his face. "Stop this. Stop it now! You know who I am. You _always_ know."

"Your identity is unknown."

The Doctor turned away from it, and Bracewell stepped forward. "Perhaps I can clarify things here, this is one of my Ironsides."

"Can I punch it, then?" I asked Bracewell, even though I knew it would hurt me more than it hurt the dalek. Actually, it probably wouldn't hurt the dalek at all, but I didn't care. I felt mad—or maybe not even mad. I felt rage, and it was different. I've never felt anger like this before, and when I looked down to see the diamond on my locket glowing an even darker red, I knew it had to be because of that. Even then, even knowing that this feeling might not even really be mine, I still didn't care. I still felt a hatred for the metal alien machine.

"Your what?" The Doctor spat, angry.

Bracewell began talking to the dalek, as if to try and clarify. "You will help the Allied cause in any way that you can?"

"Yes." It simply responded.

"Until the Germans have been utterly smashed?"

"Yes."

"And what is your ultimate aim?"

"To win the war!"

"Which one?" I challenged the dalek this time, stepping up to it. Even if it did wipe out all of my people, I wasn't going to let it intimidate me now. Its weapons looked like a plunger and a whisk! Even if I didn't really know any Time Lord other than the Doctor and the children from my flashbacks, I felt an overwhelming urge to avenge my people and my planet anyway.

The dalek didn't respond.

**888**

The Doctor studied at the diagrams and blueprints that clearly showed a dalek. "They're daleks! They're called daleks!" The Doctor exclaimed to Winston Churchill, leaning over the desk.

"They are Bracewell's Ironsides, Doctor! Look! Blueprints, statistics, field-tests, photographs. He invented them!" Winston explained, pointing to all the evidence laid out on the table.

"Invented them? Oh, no, no! No!" The Doctor argued.

"Yes! He approached one of our brass hats a few months ago. Fella's a genius."

Amy crossed her arms beside the desk. "A Scottish genius, too. Maybe you should—"

"Amy," I cut her off, warning her. Obviously, the Doctor wasn't in the mood, and I really wasn't either.

"He didn't invent them. They're alien." The Doctor stated.

"Alien?" Churchill inquired, quieter this time.

A dalek glided by the doorway, and the Doctor looked over his shoulder, sensing its presence. I stared at it, and I could sense it too.

"And totally hostile." The Doctor added.

"Precisely! They will win me the war!" Winston declared, folding over one of the blueprints to show a propaganda poster with a dalek on it that said '−to victory!'

With those words, I froze again, but this time I only saw flashes of daleks flying, shooting, and screaming. It was intense, but it was gone in seconds.

"Nova, you're shaking." Amy told me quietly.

I focused down at my hands, and realized that I was, in fact, shaking. I quickly crossed my arms. "I− I'm fine," I stuttered. I tried to hide my shaking hands, but then I noticed that my entire form was shaking anyway, and my heart was thumping loudly in my chest. Even if I didn't remember it, I felt that daleks were truly my worst enemy, and I still felt the fear and anger that I wasn't even completely sure of... which caused even more fear and anger.

Both Winston and the Doctor glanced to me this time, but thankfully the Doctor was the one who walked over to me. "Are you sure?" he asked me.

I thought about the promise I made to myself when I first stepped through the door at Amy's house, and when I chose my name. I was not going to fear them like this. There was no time. I had to be different, I had to be better, and this wasn't the worst that was going to happen. Keeping all these secrets, it was bound to get even worse than I could know, so I would have to be strong. I would be new.

Despite my promise, there was still a crack in my voice that I couldn't hide when I responded. "I hate them." I told him simply, feeling some anger and sadness replace fear. Some part of me was afraid of how I admitted I hated them so easily, but I couldn't deny it. "I hate them all."

Unexpectedly, the Doctor put his arm around my shoulder. I looked up at him to see heartbreak in his eyes, and I couldn't tell if it was because of me or not. "I know," he told me, hugging me close and kissing the top of my head. He kept his arm around my shoulder while Winston gathered the papers he needed. I felt warmer and less frightened, but there was still sadness in my heart I couldn't get rid of.

**888**

"Why won't you listen to me? Why call me in if you won't listen to me?" The Doctor complained, as the four of us found ourselves walking down a hallway again.

"When I rang you a month ago, I must admit, I had my doubts. The Ironsides seemed too good to be true." Winston evaluated.

"Yes! Right! So destroy them! Exterminate them!" The Doctor sneered.

"But imagine what I could do with a hundred! A thousand!" Winston reasoned.

"Yeah that's−that's the problem!" I told him this time, my hands flying up in distress.

The Doctor glared at a dalek that passed by and let Winston Churchill walk into the war room, but Amy and I stayed behind with the Doctor in the hallway. "Amy, tell him." The Doctor said to her.

"Tell him what?" Amy asked.

"About the Daleks," he said.

"What would I know about the Daleks?" Amy asked him, giving him a strange look, not at all knowing what to do.

"Everything. They invaded your world remember? Planets in the sky, you don't forget that!" Amy looked at him like he was ridiculous and huffed. "Amy... Tell me you remember the Daleks."

"Nope, sorry." she stated simply.

"That's not possible," he reported, studying her closely before going into the war room.

It didn't make sense then, but now I got it. When Rose found the 10th Doctor again, all the planets aligned and the daleks attacked earth, and now she didn't remember. Not only that, but it seemed the whole world didn't remember, and now that I recalled all the information I knew about the show, I knew why. I knew who made them forget, and it settled in how big the force really was, and how they were after the Doctor, and would be after me if I tried anything. Now they might even terrify me more than the daleks.

The Silence.

 


	9. Victory of the Daleks (t 2)

Amy, the Doctor and I walked into the war room, ignoring the chatters of RAF members communicating away and focusing on the dalek in front of us that wasn't supposed to be there.

"So they're up to something, but what is it? What are they after?" The Doctor asked, leaning in towards Amy and I, observing the dalek from afar.

"Well, let's just ask, shall we?" Amy suggested simply, beginning to walk over to the dalek.

"Amy... Amelia!" The Doctor tried, getting her to stay away from it, but she didn't see a problem. She casually moved closer to it and cleared her throat, tapping on the dalek's casing so it swiveled around to point its eyestalk at her.

"Can I be of assistance?" the dalek asked her, in an obedient tone that daleks never used with humans.

"Oh. Yes. Yes! See um, my friend reckons you're dangerous. That you're an alien. Is it true?" She asked the dalek.

I crossed my arms. "That's not going to work," I mumbled.

"I am your soldier." the dalek replied. I looked to the Doctor to see his head tilted and his hand over his mouth in concentration.

"Yeah. Got that bit. Love a squaddie. What else, though?" Amy asked it.

"Please excuse me. I have duties to perform." The dalek replied, swiveling back around and moving away. The Doctor went over to Winston to try and convince him again, but knowing it was a lost cause at the moment, I decided to slowly follow the dalek instead.

No one noticed me as I trailed closely behind it, and I could only hope that the dalek didn't either. I followed it through hallways until it reached its destination, which was a room where Bracewell was in. The dalek then went away somewhere else, but I wasn't concentrated on that anymore. Instead, I walked over to Bracewell quietly.

"I'm a scientist too, you know." I told him. He jumped back a little.

"Oh! My dear, you scared me. Yes yes, you like science. That's nice." He disregarded me, going back to work on his blueprints.

I faltered a little bit, and shrunk back. He spoke to me then like the other 51 scientists did, as if I couldn't do it, as if I was just a small little girl who couldn't ever work with the big boys, but maybe in a nicer way. "No, I don't just like it, it's my line of work." I tried, but then I remembered the year we were in.

Female scientists weren't unheard of, but pretty uncommon at this time, especially young ones. Bracewell sighed. "Well, aim high, I suppose."

I walked over to one of the daleks. "Oh, I'm aiming high alright. By the way, you might want to check up on those plans for the gravity bubbles." I told him, but he only waved me off again.

I walked around the dalek to face its eyestalk. "I'm Nova," I announced to it bravely. "Does that mean anything to you?" The dalek didn't say anything, once again. Why weren't the daleks responding to me? It wasn't that I was asking the wrong questions, either. When Amy talked to the same dalek before, she was really casual and Scottish about it. There had to be a reason.

Instead, it moved over to Bracewell. "Would you care for some tea?" The dalek asked him.

What was wrong with that thing? Or more importantly, what was wrong with me? "That would be very nice. Thank you." Bracewell accepted politely, before the Doctor and Amy quickly strode into the room.

"All right, Prof! The PM's been filling me in. Amazing things, these Ironsides of yours. Amazing. You must be very proud of them." The Doctor told him, picking up a random file and sitting in the chair.

"Just doing my bit." Bracewell responded humbly.

"Not bad for a paisley boy," Amy commended, picking up a scanning device from the table.

Bracewell chuckled a little. "Yes, I thought I detected a familiar cadence, my dear."

"How did you do it? Come up with the idea?" The Doctor asked him, not convinced that he was human.

"I'm telling you, gravity bubble." I reminded Bracewell, but he ignored me.

"How does the muse of invention come to anyone?" Bracewell countered.

The Doctor tossed the file he was examining back on the table. "But you get a lot of these clever notions, do you?" he remarked, a bit sarcastically.

"Well, ideas just seem to teem from my head!" Bracewell explained, shaking his hands around his head, emphasizing the teeming. "Wonderful things! Like... let me show you." He went over to another table and began picking up files. "Some musings on the potential of hypersonic flight. Gravity bubbles that could sustain life outside of the terrestrial atmosphere! Came to me in the bath!" The Doctor walked over and picked up each file for a few seconds before handing them to me to look at also.

The Doctor seemed to disregard the inventions quickly, but I took the time to inspect them. I lifted one of the blueprints, impressed, and gasped a little when I found an error. "Your blueprints for hypersonic flight would completely burn the vehicle on atmospheric re-entry," I corrected, and I noticed Amy looked a little surprised, while the Doctor seemed proud. Still, the look Bracewell was giving me made me uncomfortable, and the proud look was probably just out of pity. "I mean, probably... because, you obviously factored in the aerodynamic heating pretty well, but there's still going to be some atmospheric drag if you... yeah. I don't know. Never mind," I spoke softly, and I looked to see both the Doctor and Amy giving each other a look, smiles dimmed.

Bracewell snatched the hypersonic flight blueprint back from me and studied them carefully. "Why... you're right! I never noticed... I must remember to make adjustments." Bracewell smiled at me. I gave a shy smile back. He kind of reminded me of someone I worked with back in 51, Professor Zodiac's brother, who was the last person to join us outside of bloodlines along with Zodiac. "Wow, that's very observant! Smart bird you have here, Doctor." he said, leaning towards the Doctor in an attempt to whisper.

The Doctor cleared his throat. "And are these your ideas, or theirs?"

"No, no, no, no. These robots are entirely under my control, Doctor. They are..." A dalek came up with tea for Bracewell. "Thank you− the perfect servant." Bracewell explained to him.

"I don't know what you're up to, Professor, but whatever they've promised, you cannot trust them! Call them what you like, the Daleks are death!" The Doctor pointed at him.

"He's not the one who's up to something." I told the Doctor quietly, right when Winston came in, voice booming, followed by another dalek. Great.

"Yes, Doctor. Death to our enemies! Death to the forces of darkness, and death to the Third Reich!"

"Yes, Winston, and death to everyone else too!" The Doctor shouted.

"Would you care for some tea?" A dalek asked him, but before it could finish the sentence, the Doctor already slammed the tea tray from it in anger, cup clanging to the floor causing everyone in the room to jump. "Stop this! What are you doing here? What do you want!"

"We seek only to help you." The dalek responded.

"To do what?" The Doctor yelled angrily.

"To win the war," it simply replied.

"Really? Which war?"

There was a small pause until the dalek replied, "I do not understand."

"This war, against the Nazis? Or your war? The war against the rest of the Universe? The war against all life-forms that are not Dalek?"

The dalek's eyestalk swiveled over me for some reason, before turning back. "I do not understand. I am your soldier."

"Oh yeah? Okay, okay!" The Doctor warned, turning around and grabbing a shovel that was leaning against the wall. "OK, soldier, defend yourself!" He yelled, banging the shovel against the dalek.

"Doctor, what the devil...?" Bracewell exclaimed, but the Doctor only hit it again.

"You do not require tea?" the Dalek calmly asked, but the Doctor kept striking the dalek over and over.

"Stop it! Prime Minister, please!" Bracewell tried to interfere, protecting the machine he thought to be of his invention.

"Doctor, please, these machines are precious!" Winston argued, but the Doctor only struck it again.

"COME ON! Fight back! You want to, don't you? You know you do!" He shouted, grabbing the eyestalk and forcing it to face him.

"I must protest!" Bracewell tried again.

"Then why aren't you doing anything!" I yelled at him in anger. I looked to Amy, as if asking what to do, while the Doctor kept hitting the dalek.

"What are you waiting for? You hate me. You want to kill me. Well, go on! Kill me." he struck the dalek again. "KILL ME!"

"Doctor, be careful!" Amy tried, pushing him back, but the Doctor only shrugged her off. I considered stopping him in his outrage too, but I knew that it had to happen. Besides, he sure had a lot more pent up anger towards the daleks then I did, and even now I was kind of enjoying seeing a dalek get hit. I was also scared that he would accidentally whack me in the face with the shovel anyway.

"Please desist from striking me. I am your soldier." The dalek commanded.

"You. Are. My. ENEMY!" The Doctor shouted again, punctuating each word with another strike. "And I am yours! You are _everything_ I despise! The _worst_ thing in all creation. I've defeated you time and time again, I've defeated you. I sent you back into the void! I saved the whole of reality from you! I am the Doctor. And you are the Daleks!" he proclaimed, jump-kicking the dalek and sending it rolling backwards.

Knowing what was about to happen, I decided that now was probably a good time to step a little in front of the Doctor. Even if it wouldn't stop him, he would definitely still notice me, but it was too late.

"Correct. Review testimony," the dalek the Doctor was striking ordered the other one. The other dalek played back a recording of the Doctor's voice from just a few seconds ago. "'I am the Doctor. And you are the Daleks!'"

"Testimony? What are you talking about, testimony?" the real Doctor asked, this time.

"Transmitting testimony now," the other dalek recited.

"Transmit what, where?" the Doctor tried, but I knew exactly where it was going: to a spaceship in the sky.

**888**

In space, a dalek spaceship could be seen hiding behind the moon from Earth. In the spaceship, a dalek reached out its 'plunger' arm to the twinkling receiver.

"Receiving testimony now." It stated. Around the spaceship, the same message of the Doctor's testimony was sounded throughout, sparking a small golden dalek-shaped machine to life. It lit up over and over. "Progenitor activated. Testimony accepted! Testimony accepted!"

**888**

"Testimony accepted!" the other dalek back in the cabinet war rooms repeated.

"Get back, all of you!" the Doctor told us, spreading his arms out so Amy walked forward, but thankfully I was still standing in front of him, so I was able to run to Winston. Those daleks would kill anyone on sight, and I knew that Winston would order his soldiers to fight. I barely even thought about it, I just ran to Winston as soon as the thought came into my mind, my body carrying itself on some adrenaline-induced auto drive I never thought I had in me.

"Marines! Get−"

"BACK!" I yelled, being tall enough to cover Winston's mouth with my hand. Winston was just about to protest, until a marine walked through the doorway. A dalek laser shot one, and the other jumped back at both the order, and the laser.

"Stop it! Stop it, please! What are you doing?" Bracewell asked the daleks, as they turned to him. "You are my ironsides!"

"We are the daleks!" the first one declared.

"But I created you!" Bracewell countered, not seeming to fear the machine, only trying to calm it down.

"No," the dalek said, shooting a beam at Bracewell's arm with a spark, revealing a stump with wires sticking out in every direction. "We created you!"

"Victory! Victory! Victory!" the daleks chanted in unison, before beaming themselves up to a spaceship in a way that reminded me of Star Trek.

Amy stood pale, walking up to the Doctor slowly. "What just happened, Doctor?"

"I wanted to know what they wanted, what their plan was. _I_ was their plan!" He realized in anger, running out of the room. Wasting no time, still feeling strange adrenaline, I chased after him again through hallways and rooms until we reached the TARDIS doors.

"'Testimony Accepted'! That's what they said! _My_ testimony." The Doctor realized, Amy following close behind us.

"Don't beat yourself up! You were right. What do we do? Is this what we do now? Chase after them?" Amy insisted.

"This is what I do, yeah, and it's dangerous. So you two wait here." He told us.

"I am _not_ staying down here. I'm going with you." I told him sternly. I was so mad at the daleks I couldn't even fathom it. I promised myself I would move and help, and I was on this insane adrenaline rush I'd never experienced before. I couldn't let anyone stop me. Once again, I felt the overwhelming urge to do something.

"Nova, you're the _last_ Time Lady," he reminded me.

"Exactly! And you're the last Time Lord. I'm going with you." I affirmed again, walking to the TARDIS, but the Doctor caught me by the wrist.

"Nova, you don't even remember a Time Lord life. You remember being human. So stay down here, be human," he insisted.

I knew he was right, but for some reason, I almost felt insulted. "I remember the daleks," I explained, recalling the seconds of flashbacks I got in the war room when I started shaking. "I remember bits of them in the war. I remember pain and fear, Doctor. I feel it now, from them. Maybe I don't remember a whole life, but I remember some things, so whether you like it or not, I am a Time Lord too." I told him fiercely, because that was how I felt it. I felt hatred for the daleks and a belonging to a planet that no longer existed with every fiber of my being to the point where it didn't matter how or why, because this was it. This was the truth. No matter how comfortable I felt back at 51, I felt at home here, and I wasn't going to give it up. Maybe that's why I had the locket, so I could have both.

"Of course I like it." The Doctor responded, equally as fierce, still not letting me go. We stood there for just a few seconds; so close in proximity I could feel his breath on my face. I felt magnetized to look into his eyes with his intensely staring into mine, until Amy cleared her throat.

"So what, you mean I've got to stay safe down here in the middle of the London Blitz?" she cleared her throat, thankfully implying that I was going with him.

"Safe as it gets around me," he waved, stepping into the TARDIS, and I followed close behind.

The Doctor immediately went to work at the console, pulling a few levers down before moving the monitor that had a small blur on it. "Come on, come on," he urged it, until an image of the dalek spaceship appeared. "Bingo!"

**888**

Standing in the same place, Amy and Winston watched as the TARDIS dematerialized. "Well, what do they expect us to do now?" she complained.

Winston Churchill casually took a puff of his cigar. "KBO, of course."

"What?"

"Keep buggering on."

Amy sighed and sat in a nearby chair and slouched in hopelessness, until Breen came over with papers. "Prime Minister."

"Yes?" Winston asked, still standing.

Breen handed him the papers. "Signal from RDF, sir. Unidentified object. Hanging in the sky, Captain Childers says. We can't get a proper fix, though. It's too far up."

Amy abruptly stood up and Winston turned to her, slapping the papers in his hand. "What do you think, Miss Pond? The Doctor and Nova are in trouble, and now we know where they are."

Amy smiled, nodding slowly. "Yeah. Cos he'll be on that ship, won't he? Right in the middle of everything."

Winston gave her a small nod back. "Exactly!"

**888**

Up on the rooftop, an Air Raid Warden stood observing the scene with binoculars in hand. The city in front of him was in blackout, but behind him a light went on.

"Oi! Put that light out!" he commanded, and it went off.

**888**

The three daleks watched as the progenitor ran its program, slowly lighting up the spaceship and charging it to its full power. "The final phase commences, channel all reserve power to Progenitor," the first one stated. In a small doorway just ahead of them, the TARDIS materialized.

**888**

"How about that cuppa now, then?" The Doctor said, clapping is hands together as he strode out of the TARDIS, and I followed.

"It is the Doctor! Exterminate!" a dalek commanded.

"Wait, wait, wait, wait wait, I wouldn't if I were you!" The Doctor told them, pulling out a small round object from his inner pocket, which I knew was actually just a Jammie Dodger, and held it out in front of him. "TARDIS self-destruct. And you know what that means— my ship goes, you all go with it."

"You would not use such a device." Another dalek tested.

"Try me," he challenged, and a dalek began rolling up to him. "Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah. No scans! No nothing! One move and I'll destroy us all, you got that? TARDIS bang-bang, Daleks BOOM!" he explained. I was glad he said something silly like that to lighten the mood, because now I was really intimidated. The technology around us was so sleek yet minimalistic, and I couldn't help but wonder how daleks could possibly use it.

"Good boy." he said, as the dalek rolled back. He slowly walked to the dalek control panel, but I stayed in the same place, looking at them. "This ship's pretty beaten up— running on empty, I'd say, like you. When we last met, you were at the end of your rope. Finished," he walked all the way around the panel, and then stood back next to me.

"One ship survived." The second dalek explained.

"And then you fell through time, crippled and dying." I observed, not remembering the exact line from the episode, but knowing enough about what happened to figure it out.

"We picked up a trace. One of the Progenitor devices," the dalek continued, none of them looking at me, all of them fixated on the Doctor.

"Progenitor? What's that when it's at home?" the Doctor asked.

"It is our past. And our future."

"That's pretty deep for a salt shaker." I observed nonchalantly, even though I was slightly terrified.

The Doctor chuckled a little. "Yeah, but what does it mean, though?"

"It contains pure Dalek DNA, thousands were created, all were lost, save one."

"Okay, but there's still one thing I don't get, though— if you've got the Progenitor, why build Bracewell?" he asked them, clasping his hands together.

I stiffened at the question and at that last word. How could I not have remembered? Bracewell wasn't just a dalek robot disguised as a human... he was a bomb! Maybe if I wasn't so hung up on avenging my people I haven't even met, on feelings that I wasn't even sure were mine, I would have been down there to stop it, while the Doctor could be up here to defeat the daleks once and for all. But instead, here I am, existing when I didn't have to and not changing a single thing, useless. Now, the daleks were going to survive because of me, and no one even knew it.

"It was... necessary." The dalek replied.

"But why?" the Doctor wondered, until the eyestalk of the dalek twitched, and it all clicked in his brain. "I get it. Oh, I get it! I get it. Oh, ho, this is rich! The Progenitor wouldn't recognize you, would it? It saw you as impure, the DNA is unrecognizable as Dalek."

"A solution was devised," the dalek said.

"Yes, yes, yes. Me. My testimony. So you set a trap; you knew that the Progenitor would recognize me. The Daleks' greatest enemy! It would accept my word. My recognition of you." While the Doctor pieced things together, a dalek moved to the machine behind it and moved it's plunger-arm to a light-up button. "No, no no. What are you doing?" the Doctor noticed, holding out his Jammie Dodger in defense again.

"Withdraw now, Doctor, or the city dies in flames." A third dalek threatened.

"Who are you kidding? This ship is a wreck, you don't have the power to destroy London." the Doctor knew, but unfortunately the daleks were smarter than that.

After all, the Earth was weak— right in the middle of World War Two. Just one little spark, and...

"Watch as the humans destroy themselves."  
 ****

**888**

Back on the rooftop, the Air Raid Warden watched in confusion and fear as all around the city, lights flashed on brightly. They would surely attack now. "What the... no!"

**888**

In the War Rooms, an officer stood trying to switch off the lights. "The generators won't switch off! The lights are on all across London, Prime Minister."

"Has to be them. Has to be the Daleks." Amy told Winston, both of them leaning over the table trying to come up with a plan.

"The Germans can see every inch of the city. We're sitting ducks! Get those lights out before the Germans get here!" Winston ordered the officer, and with a nod, he was off.

Amy watched around in fear as the mood of the room quickly changed. The RAF members all around her began chanting codes into their headsets, and although Amy couldn't make out what any of the numbers meant, she knew that saying 'emergency' over and over couldn't be a good sign.

"Thousands will die if we don't get those lights out now!" Winston shouted.

Breen was the only one who took off her headset. "German bombers sighted over the Channel, sir. ETA 10 minutes, sir."

"Here they come. Get a message to Mr. Attlee. War Cabinet meeting at 0300— if we're all still here." Winston instructed another member, moving around the table.

"We can't just sit here! We've got to take the fight to the Daleks!" Amy exclaimed, not wanting to sit back and do nothing.

"How? None of our weapons are a match for theirs." Winston countered.

"Oh, look, we must have something," she hoped, beginning to pace in thought, until she remembered something. "Oh! Staring us in the face! A gift! From the Daleks!"

**888**

"Turn those lights off now. Turn London off or I swear I will use the TARDIS self-destruct!" the Doctor threatened, still holding out his Jammy Dodger.

"Stalemate, Doctor. Leave us, and return to Earth." the dalek echoed.

Slowly, I walked over to the dalek controls while the Doctor kept arguing. "Oh, that's it? That's your great victory? You leave?"

"Extinction is not an option. We shall return to our own time and begin again," the dalek chanted.

There was an odd gold piece in the center of it all that was lit up. I reached out and touched it, quickly snapping back as it burned me, hoping no one noticed, while behind me the Doctor was still arguing. "No, no, no! I won't let you get away this time! I won't!"

I stiffened. If only I hadn't messed up, then maybe the daleks wouldn't have gotten away. I turned around, hearing a sonic whooshing sound as the daleks moved away from the door. "We have succeeded— DNA reconstruction is complete." The room looked to be glowing with red energy until the doors opened with a spark. "Observe, Doctor. A new dalek paradigm." the dalek said, just as much bigger, freshly painted daleks rolled out of the room. Out they emerged from the smoke and steam, white, blue, red, orange, and yellow. "The Progenitor has fulfilled our new destiny. Behold, the restoration of the Daleks! The resurrection of the master race!"

**888**

"Bracewell! Put the gun down!" Winston ordered immediately, rushing into Bracewell's lab room with Amy to see him sitting with a revolver in his hand.

"My life is a lie, and I choose to end it." Bracewell frowned.

"In your own time paisley boy!" Amy exclaimed with a thicker Scottish accent, walking right in front of him. "Because right now, we need your help."

Bracewell was still squirming in his seat with the revolver in hand. "But those creatures...my Ironsides! They made me? I... I can remember things, so many things. The last war− the squalor and the mud and the awful, awful misery of it all. What am I? What am I?!" he asked them furiously.

Churchill, casual as ever, puffed his cigar and responded. "What you are, sir, is either on our side, or theirs. Now, I don't give a damn if you're a machine, Bracewell... Are you a _man_?" he asked firmly, with motivation in his voice.

Now, it was Amy's turn. "Listen to me. I understand. Really, I do." she told him, leaning over and gently taking the revolver from his hand. "Look, there is a spaceship up there lighting up London like a Christmas tree. Thousands of people will die tonight if we don't stop it, and you're the only one who can help take it down."

"I am?" he asked, not understanding how he could be of any help to this world when he wasn't even from it to begin with.

"You're alien technology. You're as clever as the Daleks are, so start thinking! What about rockets? You got rockets? Cause you said gravity whatsits, hypersonic flight, some kind of missile," Amy rambled, trying to remember random things from earlier that would hopefully encourage Bracewell and prove her point.

"This isn't a fireworks party, Miss Pond! We need proper tactical..." Winston trailed off and gasped, finally realizing what she was getting at. "A missile... or...?"

"Or what?" Amy prodded.

"We could send something up there, you say?" Winston asked Bracewell this time, an idea coming to mind.

"Yes, well with a gravity bubble, yes!" Bracewell took his blueprint on the gravity bubble from the table and handed it to Winston. "Theoretically, it's possible we could actually send something into space. The girl, the American one, wouldn't stop going off about it. She said it could work!" he recalled, getting enthusiastic now. If someone else agreed, maybe he really could do it.

"Bracewell..." Winston slammed the gravity bubble documents back on the table in front of him. "It's time to think big!"

**888**

"All hail the new Daleks! All hail the new Daleks!" an old dalek said.

"Yes, you are inferior," claimed a new white one.

"Yes."

"Then prepare."

"We are ready!"

"Cleanse the unclean! Total obliteration! Disintegrate!" The white dalek chanted, shooting a beam and disintegrating an old dalek into nothing, and then doing the same to each one of them until they were all gone.

"Woah," I quaked. If I wasn't scared of them before, I was now. The daleks could destroy, and they could do it easily. I couldn't shake the feeling that their success was my fault. I couldn't shake the feeling that I was either doing things wrong, or not doing enough.

"Blimey!" The Doctor followed. "What do you do to the ones who mess up?"

The white dalek began advancing towards him. "You are the Doctor! You must be exterminated!"

The Doctor pulled out his Jammy Dodger from his inner jacket pocket and held it out to the dalek again. "Don't mess with me, sweetheart."

**888**

Amy and Winston stood in the crowded war room, the ground shaking below them and dust falling from the ceiling above them as London was attacked. Bracewell came into the room rolling in a device on an office chair. "At last! Are they ready?" Winston asked him.

"I hope so! But in the meantime," Bracewell lifted the heavy device onto the desk with a screen and a few control knobs. "This will pick up dalek transmissions." Bracewell slapped the side of the device, and the monitor sparked to life to show a black and white image of the Doctor and Nova facing a dalek up on the spaceship.

"It's them! It's the Doctor and Nova!" Amy exclaimed, smiling as they all crowded around the tiny screen.

On the screen, the dalek seemed to be introducing the others to the Doctor and Nova. "Scientist, Strategist, Drone, Eternal, Supreme."

"Which would be you, I'm guessing? Well, you know, nice paint job. I'd be feeling pretty swish if I looked like you. Pretty Supreeeeeme," the Doctor trailed, trying to buy time.

"They've got company. New company. We've got to hurry up!" Amy panicked.

The phone by them rang, and Bracewell picked it up. "Yes? Right, right, thanks!" Bracewell hung up and turned to Winston. "Ready when you are, Prime Minister!"

"Splendid!" Winston replied, as the screen showed a picture of the dalek spaceship in green and black.

"Spaceship's exact co-ordinates located!" Bracewell announced.

"Go to it, Group Captain! Go to it!" Winston told the Group Captain, who picked up the phone and began barking orders.

"Broadsword to Danny Boy! Broadsword to Danny Boy! Scramble! Scramble! Scramble!"

**888**

"Question is, what do we do now? Either you turn off your clever machine or I'll blow you and your new paradigm into eternity." The Doctor threatened.

"And yourself," the white dalek reminded him.

"Occupational hazard."

"And..." There was a long pause. "No-va." the dalek reminded him, stretching out the word as if it were hard to say.

The Doctor glanced to me. "So you _do_ know me!" I exclaimed. If they knew who I was, why were they ignoring me? How did they even know who I was? This was a new dalek. Either these daleks shared knowledge, or they were from a different time period.

They ignored me once again, and the blue 'scientist' dalek rolled up. "Scan reveals nothing! TARDIS self-destruct device non-existent!"

"All right," the Doctor gave in, taking a bit of the fake self-destruct button. "It's a Jammie Dodger, but I was promised tea!"

A siren sounded, and all the daleks headed towards the scanner behind them. "Alert! Unidentified projectile approaching! Correction, multiple projectiles!" the daleks observed. The Doctor handed me the half of the Jammie Dodger that he didn't eat and went to check the scanner that was behind us. I shrugged and ate it.

"What have the humans done?" a dalek asked, sounding as enraged as a dalek could possibly sound.

"Gravity bubble! I told you guys!" I said to the Doctor.

"Explain! Explain! Explain!" the dalek chanted, until a new voice sounded throughout the ship.

"Danny Boy to the Doctor, Danny Boy to the Doctor! Are you receiving me? Over."

The Doctor spun away from the scanner and laughed. "Oh Winston, you beauty!"

Outside, I knew that there were three planes flying through space around us that Winston, Amy, and Bracewell sent up. "Danny Boy to the Doctor! Come in. Over."

"Loud and clear, Danny Boy! Big dish, side of the ship, blow it up! Over!" The Doctor commanded. He grabbed my hand and began pulling me back past the daleks.

"Exterminate the Doctor and Nova!" they commanded. I ducked as the lasers shot out and the Doctor pulled me back through the doorway and into the TARDIS.

Once we were in, the Doctor let go of my hand and moved a few things around the TARDIS until we could hear the pilots communicating, and Winston and Bracewell talking to them. Bracewell... he was a bomb. If I would have just listened to the Doctor and stayed behind with Amy, I probably could have disabled him somehow while the Doctor could get rid of the daleks forever. What was the point in my being here if I wasn't going to do anything? This was only the beginning, after all. What if I messed up even more? The Time Lords' greatest enemy would have been wiped from existence, but now we were going to have to go back to Earth. The daleks would leave and become more powerful than ever now, all because of me.


	10. Victory of the Daleks (pt 3)

The Doctor and I stood in the TARDIS, listening in to both pilot and dalek transmissions. "Danny Boy to the Doctor..." the pilot called solemnly, "only me left now. Anything you can do, sir? Over." the pilot asked from his plane in space, hopelessly trying to take down the dalek ship with one little fighter plane, even if it was installed with alien technology.

The Doctor hung his head low and picked up a small microphone from the console. "I can disrupt the Dalek shields, but not for long. Over."

"Good show, Doctor, go to it. Over." The pilot responded. The Doctor began pulling levers and typing things in the console to disrupt the shields.

I felt the ground shake a little, and I knew that the pilot had successfully blasted part of the ship. "Danny Boy to the Doctor... going in for another attack."

The Doctor picked up his microphone again, looking at the monitor. "The Doctor to Danny Boy. The Doctor to Danny Boy. Destroy this ship! Over." he commanded.

"What about you, Doctor?" Danny Boy asked him.

"We'll be okay."

I stood leaning against the rail and nervously played with my locket, not wanting to deal with what was next. To the left of us, a white dalek appeared on a big circular monitor. "Doctor! Call off your attack!"

"Ah-ha, what? And let you scuttle off back to the future? No fear. This is the end for you. The final end!" The Doctor hissed, walking up to the monitor. I kept tangling and untangling the long chain in my hands. Maybe it would have been the final end if I hadn't been so stupid.

"Call off the attack, or we will destroy the Earth." The dalek echoed.

The Doctor looked slightly triumphant. "I'm not stupid mate, you've just played your last card."

"Bracewell is a bomb," the dalek told him simply.

The Doctor was a little worried now. "You're bluffing. Deception's second nature to you. There isn't a sincere bone in your body! There isn't a bone... in your body."

"His power is derived from an Oblivion Continuum! Call off your attack, or we will detonate the android."

The Doctor went back to the console and pushed a button, disappearing the big monitor so that now the dalek was on the small TARDIS monitor in front of him. Now it was just him and the dalek, face to... shield, or armor, casing... thingy. "No! This is my best chance ever! The last of the Daleks! I can rid the Universe of you, once and for all!"

"Then do it. But we will shatter the planet below! The Earth will die screaming!"

"And if I let you go, you'll be stronger than ever. A new race of Daleks."

"Then choose, Doctor! Destroy the Daleks or save the Earth. Begin countdown of Oblivion Continuum! Choose, Doctor! Choose! Choose!"

The Doctor looked down a little before turning to me. He looked at me as if he were asking me what to do. Of course, I still had a blinding hatred and fear for the daleks that felt so powerful it was terrifying, but there was no way I would let the earth die. I knew the bomb was real, and it was my fault, but no matter how much I hated the daleks, those people didn't deserve it. So I walked over and picked up the microphone. I handed it to him, knowing that Danny Boy probably wouldn't trust an order from me, and I wasn't sure what to say anyway. The Doctor eyed me carefully and took the microphone solemnly before speaking into it. "The Doctor to Danny Boy. The Doctor to Danny Boy. Withdraw."

"Say again, sir. Over." The pilot replied.

"Withdraw! Return to Earth. Over and out," the Doctor spoke again, this time with more life in his voice, realizing what was at stake.

"But sir...!" The pilot began to argue, but the Doctor cut him off.

"There's no time, you have to return to Earth now! Over!" The Doctor said again, putting the microphone back in his place and pulling levers, setting us back on course for the Earth. Almost immediately, he ran out the TARDIS and we were back in the storage room in the war cabinets. I followed him as he ran back to the map room to see Amy, Winston, and Bracewell there among others. He didn't even give it a second thought before running up to Bracewell and punching him square in the jaw.

"Doctor!" Amy gasped in shock.

The Doctor shook his hand in pain. "Ow! Sorry, Professor. You're a bomb! An inconceivably massive Dalek bomb."

"What?!" Bracewell breathed, from his spot lying on the floor.

"There's an Oblivion Continuum inside you-- a captured wormhole that provides perpetual power. Detonate that, and the Earth will bleed through into another dimension!" The Doctor knelt beside him while I knelt on the other side, trying to remember what it was that Amy said to stop the bomb. The Doctor opened Bracewell's shirt and pulled out his sonic screwdriver. "Now keep down!"

His skin seemed to open to the side like layers, revealing a metal chest underneath it. In the middle was a blue light up circular pad that kind of reminded me of Iron Man that was divided into 5 sections. One of the sections lit up.

"Well?" Amy asked, trying to grasp what was going on.

"He needs to stay human. He needs to remember what it's like to be human and then the bomb won't go off, right? He's dalek technology, the bomb is dalek technology, and daleks are only hate. He just has to fight that and remember being human." I explained. "So you have to tell us. Tell us what you remember about your life." I told Bracewell, wasting no time.

Two of the sections were already turning red as he began talking. That was strange, I didn't remember it being that fast in the show. "My family ran the Post Office. It's a little place just near the abbey. Just by the ash trees. There used to be eight trees but...but there was a storm."

"And your parents? Come on! Tell me!" The Doctor hurried.

"Good people. Kind people. They... They died. Scarlet fever." Bracewell stuttered. I tensed just a little when he said the word Scarlet.

"What was that like? How did it feel?" The Doctor asked him, and already, the next panel was turning yellow. This was way too fast. This wasn't right... I must have done something on the dalek ship.

"Please..." Bracewell begged, but the Doctor was determined. "How did it make you feel, Edwin? Tell me! Tell me now!"

I racked my brain, trying to remember what I did on the dalek ship. I just stood there really, although I did get shocked. Maybe that was it. I touched the golden progenitor thing, so maybe that did something. There were already four red panels, which meant I had to act now. It would take longer for Amy to figure it out, even though I wanted to let her, and probably should have.

"No, wait." I told the Doctor. I leaned closer to Bracewell and mustered the calmest tone I could manage, as opposed to the Doctor's rushed one. "Have you ever loved someone, even when you know you really shouldn't?"

"W...what?" Bracewell stuttered again.

Amy came to kneel beside me, and I was glad she figured out what I was trying to do, because I felt like I would mess things up even more if I said things she was supposed to say. "It hurts, doesn't it? But it's a good kind of hurt."

Bracewell sighed a little. "I really shouldn't talk about her."

"Oh, there's a her," Amy raised her eyebrows.

"What was her name?" The Doctor asked, catching on.

"Dorabella," Edwin replied hesitantly.

"Dorabella? It's a lovely name, it's a beautiful name." The Doctor smiled, seeing that it was starting to work. The last tile turned completely blue.

"What was she like, Edwin?" Amy asked him.

Bracewell looked up and a dreamy look crossed his face with a hint of a smile. "Oh... Such a smile. And her eyes... Her eyes were so blue...Almost violet. Like the last touch of sunset on the edge of the world... Dorabella..." he sighed, and all the panels turned blue.

"Welcome to the human race..." The Doctor smiled. He looked up and smiled at Amy and I too, before snapping and pointing to Winston. "You're brilliant," he pointed to Bracewell, "You're brilliant," he looked to Amy now, "You're brilliant," he leaned over Bracewell and kissed her on the forehead and she giggled. Then he looked to me. "And you... I..." he leaned over Bracewell and kissed me on the forehead also before standing. "Now, gotta stop them! Stop the daleks!" he announced, running out of the room.

"Wait! Doctor! Wait... Wait, " Bracewell stopped him, sitting up. "It's too late. Gone. They've gone."

I stood up and closed my eyes. I had a much better chance of stopping this than the Doctor knew, and I didn't. I proved to myself right now that I remembered how to shut Bracewell down, so I really could have done it. "NO, no, no! They can't! They can't have got away from me again!" he shouted.

I winced a little, and Bracewell adjusted his glasses from his spot on the floor. "No, I can feel it, my mind is clear. The Daleks have gone."

The Doctor held on to a pole, all his energy drained as he leaned against it. I fidgeted in place a little, the air in the room growing tense.

"Doctor. It's OK! You did it, you stopped the bomb. Doctor?" Amy asked, walking up to him.

"I had a choice. And they knew I'd choose the Earth. The Daleks have won. They beat me. They've won." The Doctor gulped, defeated.

"But you saved the Earth. Not too shabby, is it...?" Amy asked. Thankfully, everyone in the room was staring at the Doctor, so no one noticed me glaring hard at the ground. "Is it?" Amy asked again.

I recovered a little, and looked up. "No," the Doctor remarked softly, smiling slowly. "It's not too shabby."

"It's a brilliant achievement, my dear friend. Here, have a cigar!" Winston bellowed, handing him a cigar.

"No," the Doctor declined, waving it away.

**888**

Back on the rooftop, the Air Raid Warden helped a group of Marines raise the Union Flag. It flew proudly in the wind, symbolizing the small victory. Little did they know the flag not only represented England, but in that moment, it was for all of the Earth.

**888**

"So, what now, then?" Amy asked Winston Churchill, the three of us standing around the war map.

"I still have a war to run, Miss Pond."

A woman came up to him and handed him a paper, almost as if proving his point. "Prime Minister," Winston took the paper from her.

"Oh, thank you." He read the document and sighed. "They hit the Palace and St Paul's again. Fire crews only just saved it." He announced, but Amy and I got distracted when Breen walked in the room, sobbing and hugging a pilot's cap.

"Is she okay?" Amy asked.

"She just lost someone." I told her.

Another woman went up to Breen and began comforting her, and I could hear her repeating comforting words over and over, saying she was sorry.

"Where's the Doctor?" Amy asked.

"Tying up loose ends. I've taken out all the alien tech Bracewell put in." The Doctor replied, walking into the room.

Amy and I moved to stand next to him while Winston gave him a stern look. "Won't you reconsider, Doctor? Those Spitfires would win me the war in 24 hours!"

"Exactly," the Doctor commented, sipping his tea.

"But why not? Why can't we put an end to all this misery?" Winston begged him.

The Doctor put his cup down. "Oh, it doesn't work like that, Winston. It's gonna be tough. There are terrible days to come. The darkest days. But you can do it, you know you can."

"Stay with us, and help us win through! The world needs you."

The Doctor shook his head. "The world doesn't need me."

"No?" Winston asked, confused.

"The world's got Winston Spencer Churchill." The Doctor smiled, holding two fingers in a 'V' for Victory again.

Winston chuckled and put the papers down on the desk beside him. "It's been a pleasure, Doctor. As always."

"Too right," the Doctor confirmed, holding out his hands and hugging him.

"Goodbye, Doctor." Winston told him.

"Oh, shall we say adieu?" The Doctor grinned, pulling away.

"Indeed." Winston agreed, before turning to Amy. "Goodbye, Miss Pond."

Amy laughed and put her hands beside her head in disbelief. "It's... It's been amazing meeting you."

"I'm sure it has!" Winston smiled. Amy leaned forward to kiss Winston on the cheek, and then he turned to me. "And you, Nova." He took my hand and kissed the back of it, and I couldn't help but giggle a little. Winston gave the Doctor one last nod and turned to walk away.

"Oi, Churchill!" Amy called. He turned back and Amy held out her hand. "TARDIS key. The one you just took from the Doctor." I laughed a little as the Doctor nearly chocked on his tea and pat his pockets to check for the key, which wasn't there.

"Oh, she's good, Doctor! Sharp as a pin!" Winston chuckled, handing the key to Amy. "Almost as sharp as me!" The Doctor turned his head sideways and gave us a lazy grin as Winston lit his cigar. "KBO!" he reminded us, walking away once again.

Moments later, the Doctor held out his hand in front of Amy. Amy rolled her eyes and slapped the key in his hand.

**888**

The Doctor, Amy, and I walked back into Bracewell's lab so see him standing stoically at his desk with a black leather glove over his stump of wires now, waiting for the inevitable, or at least what he thought to be the inevitable. "I've been expecting you, Doctor. I knew this moment had to come."

"Moment?" The Doctor asked.

"It's time to de-activate me." Bracewell sighed.

"Is it? Oh, uh..." The Doctor turned to look at Amy and I, and we both raised our eyebrows at him. "Yeah."

Bracewell sighed and turned to face us. "You have no choice. I'm Dalek technology. Can't allow me to go pottering around down here where I have no business."

"No, you're dead right, Professor. One hundred percent right. And by the time I get back here in... what, ten minutes?" The Doctor asked Amy, who made a strained face.

"Mmm, more like 15."

The Doctor nodded. "Fifteen minutes, yeah, that's exactly what I'm going to do. You are going to be so de-activated. It's going be like you've never even been... activated."

"Yeah, 15," I confirmed.

"15 minutes?" Bracewell asked.

"More like 20, if I'm honest. Once Pond and Nova and I see to the urgent thing..." The Doctor trailed, looking to us for help.

"Yes!" Amy pointed at him.

"Really important. Thing." I added.

"...we've got to see to. The... the... See?" The Doctor asked him.

Bracewell looked down. "Very well, Doctor. I shall wait here and... prepare myself."

Amy leaned over to the Doctor and I. "That Dalek tech's a little bit slow on the uptake," she muttered. "That thing we've got to do!" She exclaimed. "Gonna take half an hour, realistically, isn't it, Doctor?" Amy shouted obviously.

"Easily! So no running off, that's what I'm saying. Don't go trying to find that little Post Office with the ash trees or that girl... What was her name?" the Doctor hinted.

"Dorabella?" Bracewell asked.

"Dorabella." The Doctor confirmed. "On no account go looking for her. Mind you, you can get a lot done in half an hour."

The Doctor began smiling a bit, and then Bracewell caught on, smiling wide and laughing. "Thank you, thank you Doctor!"

"Come along, Pond." the Doctor said, turning away and walking out, Amy and I giving each other that post-adventure giggle that seemed to be a continuing trend for us now, before following the Doctor out also, leaving Bracewell to live his human life.

**888**

"So, you have enemies then?" Amy asked the Doctor as we stood outside the TARDIS doors.

"Everyone's got enemies," the Doctor told her, turning around and leaning back on the TARDIS doors. Amy and I moved to either side of him.

"Yeah, but mine's the woman outside Budgens with the mental Jack Russell. You've got, like, you know, _arch_ -enemies." Amy emphasized.

"Suppose so," the Doctor replied, while Amy looked at me, waiting for a reply.

"I don't even know what a Budgens is," I admitted, and she laughed at me.

"Oh yeah. I forget you were American," she told me, and I faltered a little at the fact that she said _were_. "And here's me thinking we'd just be running through time, being daft and fixing stuff. But no, it's dangerous."

"Yup. Very." The Doctor recalled. "Is that a problem?"

Amy looked to him. "Well I'm still here, aren't I? You're worried about the daleks."

"I'm always worried about the daleks," he whispered, looking up.

"And you are too." Amy looked to me, leaning forward to see me on the other side of the Doctor.

"Well, that's kind of a new thing for me." I admitted again.

"It'll take time, though, won't it? There's still not many of them. They'll need a while to build themselves up." Amy tried to give us hope.

The Doctor stopped leaning on the TARDIS and turned to Amy. "It's not that. There's something else. Something we've forgotten. Or rather you have."

"Me?" Amy asked.

"You didn't know them, Amy. You'd never seen them before. And you should have done. You should." he told her, unlocking the TARDIS doors and going inside. Amy looked at me confusedly but I only shrugged, and she stepped in also, following him inside. I turned and looked back at the scene one last time, not knowing if I'll ever see it again, and then I saw it-- the crack in the wall.

**888**

Once the Doctor had officially set us on a smooth course in the time vortex, Amy sighed. "Well, I don't know about you Time Lords, but we've been up for two days straight. I'm absolutely knackered! Night," she told us, walking away. The Doctor and I both said goodnight to her back, and then we were both alone.

"I'm sorry," I blurted to the Doctor, and he stopped poking around and looked at me.

"Why?"

"For not staying behind." I spoke quickly, trying to think of a way to admit my mistake to him.

"What are you talking about?" he asked me, moving closer.

"If I had stayed behind with Amy, I could have deactivated Bracewell and you could have destroyed the daleks, forever." I told him, looking down.

"Hey," he spoke softly, "That wasn't your fault. You couldn't have known," he reassured me, though really, it was only less reassuring, because I did know. "But you have to tell me now, Nova. Who are you, really?" he asked me.

I looked up at him and bit my lip, taking a deep breath. I couldn't tell him the complete truth, and I hated it, but I had to say something. I had to try. "Okay..." I started carefully. "You know how I'm a scientist?" I asked, and he nodded. "Well um, I work at Area 51. I mean, I didn't have a choice, but I don't' know... it's not something I'm really proud of," I rushed nervously.

The Doctor nodded, not really showing any other expression on his face besides concentrated. I had no idea what Area 51 was like over here, or if it was just the same, but I did know that I had to go back. Even though I had very few friends, I still had them, and my dad. I couldn't possibly just leave them without explanation. I would miss them, and I would hope that they'd miss me too. So I had to figure out a way to explain it to him, so I could go back.

I took a deep breath. "And that's where this takes me," I told him, pulling out my locked from under my shirt. "I don't know why. I don't even remember getting it, I've just always had it."

Okay, so maybe it wasn't the exact thing that it did, but I couldn't tell the truth. Besides, at least I finally admitted to where I work. It's not like I'm completely lying, either. It's just... an abridged version of the truth. I had to tell him somehow, because I had to go back. I wasn't completely ready to do this, and not staying with Bracewell was proof. Not only that, but even if I had a Time Lord family and everything, I still have one at 51, and I'm not leaving them now.

The Doctor walked back over to the console. "Well, I don't know much about it, you know. I've never been there, surprisingly. I suppose I could go see it, now−"

"No!" I shouted, cutting him off, though I was extremely relieved that he claimed to have never been there and not know very much about it. I guess he just didn't bother with America that much.

"Why? What's wrong with your job?" he asked me curiously.

I gulped. Sure, the actual problem was that it was in a different universe, so who knows what it's like here, but I didn't want to admit that what was really wrong with my job was _me_. Not only was our department's moral code a little messed up, taking things from people, or sometimes even taking actual people and testing on them, but I wasn't even that good at it. The only reason I hadn't become a janitor or something yet is because I love science anyway, so I guess Zodiac just cut me some, or a lot, of slack. I was always messing up, and the others would always give me annoyed looks... but when we discovered something, when I got really excited, they gave me pitied looks.

I had to come up with an excuse, quickly. The best lies are the ones with a little truth in them, after all. "We're American. It's small, and everyone knows everyone. At least 10 people would shoot you on sight." I told him, and this time I wasn't exactly lying. If a normal citizen took one step across the perimeter line, they would be shot. The secrets we kept were precious, rare, and deadly. Only the people that worked there and security detail had authorization to go in. We couldn't risk anything.

Thankfully, he nodded and seemed to get it. "Is that what you were afraid to tell me?" he asked me, leaning back on the console.

I shifted back and forth a little, nervously. "Yeah, so... If you want me to leave or something..." There are a million things I was afraid to tell him, not only because I would probably get some kind of alien-induced heart attack if I tried, but because I was afraid he would look at me differently.

"I don't want you to leave." he said sternly. "Tell me-- just tell me, one thing," he hesitated. "Your name as a Time Lord is a promise you make to yourself. Why did you choose your name? What does it mean?" he asked me.

I thought about it. At the time I chose it, there was something inside me that just told me it was my name, even before, but I felt like it also came with a message. I was timid, before. I would do something and then shrink back, or be forced to do things I didn't want to and not complain anyway. I had chances to help people, and I didn't take them. But here, I could be anyone else. I could be someone different. I could be the girl who helped people and took chances, and I could be..."New," was all I managed to say, quietly.

"And that's all that matters. Even if you go back," he assured me, smiling softly. I knew there was some truth to that, but I couldn't help but wonder if he would say the same thing if he knew exactly everything that was going on right now. It's not like I had much of a choice anyway, but I felt that even if I didn't have the weird mental trigger inside me, I still wouldn't tell him.

"But I do have to go back sometimes, Doctor. I have friends and family. I don't want to leave it." I explained. I was nervous about being gone so long after what happened last time, but at the time, although begrudgingly, Zodiac explained that I had only been gone two hours. I had to hope he wasn't lying.

The Doctor nodded and looked a little sad. "Hey, I'll be back." I told him. "Seriously, really, really quickly. I have to do this now. Tell Amy if I'm not here in the morning!" I hurried, reaching to my locket and pressing the crystal before I changed my mind.

**888**

I landed in the same exact place I was before, just at the entrance of my apartment with my backpack and a slight headache again. I couldn't believe I did that. I couldn't believe that I told the Doctor and then left, and that he seemed to be okay with it.

Once my headache subsided, I noticed the house was silent. "Dad?" I called, walking to his room and finding it empty. After everything that happened, I thought he would come back. Sure, he was on a mission in Rome somewhere to retrieve something, but he's come back early before. Something alien had happened to me. I could have died or something, and he still stayed halfway across the world.

I walked over to the couch in the living room and plopped down on it. I looked at the phone and thought of calling Meredith or Dylan, but then I spotted a light on the answer machine. I sighed and leaned over and pressed the button to listen to it.

"Hey, Scarlette. Sorry I won't be home tonight. I heard what happened, sorry about that, kiddo. Don't worry, though, strange things like that happen to everyone at some point. Did I ever tell you the story of how I found this substance; just on the floor, and when I touched it all my fingers were glued together? Took them days to get them unstuck! So at least you're home safe with all your fingers. I'll be there tomorrow, hopefully. I might even bring Sally along. Love you, see you soon,"

I laughed a little at my father's strange antics and turned the machine off. I felt comfortable and safe, but for just a split second, I couldn't help but think that he wasn't my real dad anymore, and I couldn't help but wonder if he would ever know.

 


	11. Time of Angels (pt 1)

It was a beautiful day outside. The sky was perfectly clear blue, and the grass was green in the open park. A man stood in the middle of it, slowly spinning in awe. His eyes had a glassy, drugged look to them, and just at the corner of his lips, was the mark of red lipstick. Three men walked up to the man. The older one in the middle was in an evening jacket. He was the boss, but instead of holding a gun, he held a handkerchief, and used it to wipe the lipstick of the face of the man who was in a daze.

"It's a beautiful day," the young man with the lipstick print said, only it wasn't, really. It was only a beautiful day for him, because he was under an illusion, and the three men who were aware of the fact that they were actually standing in the corridor of a spaceship knew exactly why.

"Hallucinogenic lipstick," the older boss man observed, his face turning hard, knowing what was coming. "She's here."

**888**

In another corridor of the spaceship, the woman in question strutted down the hallway in red high heels like she owned the place, her long black dress flowing around her ankles. She stopped in front of a door, pulled out a gun from her bag, and fired at the lock. The door slid open to reveal a black cube with a hole through its center, and the woman walked up to it, tilting the cube so the top faced her. She charged up her gun, changing its setting to become a blowtorch, and began writing symbols into the cube.

**888**

12,000 years later, Amy was stubbornly following around the Doctor through a medieval looking museum as he gave out his opinions of all the objects on display. "Wrong! Wrong!" The Doctor called, pointing at the cases as he walked around them. "Bit right, mostly wrong. I love museums."

"Yeah, great. Can we go to a planet now? Big space ship, Churchill's bunker...? You promised me a planet next. When is Nova getting back?" she complained. The Doctor explained everything he knew about Nova to her and where she went. It made perfect sense to Amy, and she knew that Nova would come back. The Doctor, on the other hand, seemed really jittery about it.

"I don't know about her," he waved off nervously. "But this, Amy, this isn't any old asteroid. It's the Delirium Archive-- final resting place of the headless monks-- the biggest museum ever," he told her, as he rushed around the displays and peered into them.

"You've got a time machine, what do you need museums for?" Amy complained, barely glancing at the artifacts she passed by.

"Wrong! Very wrong!" The Doctor exclaimed, pointing accusingly at one of the cases, before running up to another one. "Oooh, one of mine," he moved on to another one, "Also one of mine."

Amy stopped at that glass and peered down into it. "Oh, I see. It's how you keep score." She figured, but the Doctor had already moved his attention to the next display case, and seemed to be really intrigued by it. He walked all around it and rested his clasped hands on top of the display case, peering down at it with concentration.

"Oh great, an old box." Amy stated, looking down at the rustic box with foreign symbols on it, clearly unimpressed.

"It's from one of the old starliners. A Home Box." The Doctor explained to her.

Amy propped up an arm and leaned on it. "What's a Home Box?"

"Like a black box on a plane, except it homes. Anything happens to the ship, the Home Box flies home, with all the flight data." The Doctor explained to her.

"So?" Amy asked, trying her best to seem interested, although at the moment, she really didn't care. She wanted Nova back, so they could see a planet.

"The writing, the graffiti-- Old High Gallifreyan. The lost language of the Time Lords. There were days, there were many days, these words could burn stars and raise up empires, and topple Gods," he echoed proudly.

Maybe Amy was slightly intrigued now. "What does it say?"

The Doctor swallowed his pride a little. "Hello, sweetie."

**888**

When the woman finished perfectly etching the symbols onto the box, she lowered her glasses and winked at the security camera, before walking away. Two armed guards turned the corner and stopped, raising their rifles as their boss in a suit and tie approached more sedately, standing between the two men, glaring at the woman before him. "Party's over, Doctor Song."

**888**

The alarm bells rang as the Doctor ran to the TARDIS with the old box in hand, Amy following closely behind. The Doctor sent them into flight and then hooked up the box to the console.

"Why are we doing this?" Amy asked him, only slightly out of breath from running from security.

"Cause someone on a space ship 12,000 years ago is trying to attract my attention. Let's see if we can get the security playback working." The Doctor hooked up one last wire to the box, and sure enough, the TARDIS monitor above sparked to life with grainy black-and-white footage of the woman, River Song, winking at the camera. Amy smiled a little and the Doctor turned something on the box. The image switched to River Song at the door, and there was a man's voice in the background.

**888**

"The party's over, Doctor Song," The man in the suit and tie said. "Yet you're still on board."

River Song turned around to face him. "Sorry, Alistair. I needed to see what was in your vault. Do you all know what's down there? Any of you? Because I'll tell you something: This ship won't reach its destination."

Alistair pretended to be unfazed. "Wait till she runs. Don't make it look like an execution." He told his men, not looking away from River Song.

River shrugged and looked at her watch. "Triple-seven, five... "

**888**

The Doctor and Amy were carefully listening in to River on the monitor as she continued reading out the code. "...slash, three, four, nine by ten, zero, twelve, slash, acorn. Oh, and I could do with an air corridor."

The Doctor quickly went to type on the keyboard. "What was that, what did she say?" Amy asked him, as he rushed around on the console.

"Co-ordinates!"

**888**

River Song smirked. "Like I said on the dance floor-- you might want to find something to hang on to!"

Alistair was confused for a moment, until he noticed the timer beside the door begin to beep frantically. Realizing what was about to happen, him and his guards grabbed hold to the pipes on the wall, nearly sucked into space away as River blew one last kiss, flying out of the open doors.

**888**

The Doctor let out a triumphant whoop and opened the doors to the TARDIS, materializing it mid-space right behind River Song. He reached out his hand and caught River Song as she landed on top of him, knocking them to the floor.

"Doctor?" Amy asked him.

"River?" The Doctor asked, as they stood up and looked out the door.

"Follow that ship!" River told him.

**888**

Believe it or not, my least favorite part of my job isn't the crippling guilt of testing on stolen objects or the limitations I have from the outside world. Nope. Those are the weird things that I'm used to, and now that I've gotten so accustomed to doing weird stuff, the one thing I hate the most is the normal thing− _filing_.

Yes, contrary to popular belief, the United States Government of the early 21st century has not yet developed holographic storage, and even though we do have thousands of computers, those can be hacked into and deleted in just a matter of seconds. So we're still required to file things, because those are surprisingly harder to destroy. Especially since we keep them in the underground storage unit that feels more like a giant refrigerator.

I can figure out missing DNA nuclides perfectly, memorize the right sequence of compounds, and perform the job of an anesthesiologist on an alien artifact all while worrying about the safety of Dylan while he's on a mission. But apparently, I can't file without getting a stupid paper cut while worrying about getting back to the Doctor.

"Ouch! Ugh," I pouted, looking at the small dot of blood coming from my pinky finger and sucked on it.

"You alright?" Dylan asked me, a few feet down to my right. The storage room was lit a dim yellow and red like an old library, and it almost looked like one from afar. It was huge in here, probably the size of a football field, with years and years of information locked away, and space for more. Dylan was working with me on the new boxes, since apparently I need time to ' _psychologically recuperate after the tragic mishap_ ,' or something lame like that, before working on another project. And poor Dylan was stuck with me, being my partner.

"Yeah, no, fine. I just hate these files, and they hate me right back." I complained. "This is so sad. Who usually does this?"

Dylan shrugged and walked over to me. "I don't know, actually. They probably have a way to do it and aren't telling us." He took my hand and looked at it closely.

"Dylan, it's just a paper cut." I told him, almost laughing at how concerned he seemed over the little thing.

He grinned at me. "I know. Just making sure there wasn't any psychological damage," he joked, bringing my hand to his lips and kissing the cut.

I laughed a little and tried not to blush. "Oh, shut up."

He laughed a little too, and then the room went silent for a long moment. "I−"

The door opening on the floor above us cut off Dylan. Meredith walked in, looking down at us through the balcony. "Shift's over, you guys."

I ran up the staircase and hugged her. "Oh thank god. You saved my life. I was _dying_  down there, Mer."

"You're so dramatic, Scarlette," she rolled her eyes, letting go of me. "Hey, do you think I can sleep over tonight, by the way? It's been a while."

I widened my eyes at the thought, and then smiled, hoping it wasn't too obvious. I absolutely _had_ to go back-- I felt bad for leaving Amy and the Doctor, but I still wasn't 100% sure how long I would be gone for. I shrugged anyway. "Yeah, of course. Just let me check with my Dad."

"Okay." She pat my shoulder, "It's a half-day. Go home." she laughed at me.

"Yeah, yes. Going home!" I exclaimed, dashing out the door before anyone could say anything else to keep me behind for one more second.

**888**

Amy stood hanging on to the console, observing as the Doctor and River maneuvered the TARDIS. She was trying not to fall over due to the TARDIS shaking around. Maybe she should take off her shoes, like this River woman had. She was still trying to figure it all out. This woman magically knew how to fly the TARDIS, and seemed so comfortable with it all that she even hooked her heels on the TARDIS monitor.

"They've gone into warp drive, we're losing them! Stay close!" River ordered the Doctor, who was pulling levers and pushing buttons all over the place.

"I'm trying!" he complained.

"Use the stabilizers!" River ordered again.

"It doesn't have stabilizers!" The Doctor complained back.

"The blue switches!"

"The blue ones don't do anything, they're just...blue!"

"Yes, they're blue, they're blue stabilizers!" River huffed, switching them on herself. As soon as she did, the ship stopped wobbling around and everything became quiet and normal. "See?"

"Yeah, well, it's just boring now, isn't it? They're boring-ers." The Doctor complained, not appreciating being beaten at his own game, jabbing the buttons over and over. "They're blue boring-ers!"

Amy still wasn't getting it, and went up to the Doctor and whispered to him. "Doctor, how come she can fly the TARDIS?"

The Doctor was still mad. "You call that flying the TARDIS? Ha!" he replied aloud, pointing to River condescendingly. He went off to the pilot's seat and sat there, sulking.

"Okay! I've mapped the probability vectors, done a fold-back on the temporal isometry, charted the ship to its destination, and parked us right along side." River said casually, pressing a button as a small gong sound was heard. Amy had her mouth open slightly, in shock. 

Who was this woman?

**888**

This time, I made sure to actually go into my room and lock the door. I was about to leave when something spotted my eye. I took some in my hand, and then pressed the crystal on my necklace again.

**888**

"...Charted the ship to its destination, and parked us right along side." I heard a voice say, and I immediately started panicking as I recognized who it was.

"What the," I began, but I couldn't continue with the sharp pain I felt in the front of my head, and also in my stomach. I looked down at my hands and was thankful that the saltwater taffy I brought with me from my room made it through.

"Nova!" I heard three people shout at once, all with different tones of voice. Amy sounded relieved, the Doctor sounded shocked, and River sounded... worried.

I felt someone spin me towards them, and I finally focused my eyes with the pain subsiding, and realized it was River Song-- _The_ River Song, and she sounded worried about me. "Nova, are you alright now?" she asked me. My eyes widened upon both seeing her, and also, her worrying about my well being.

"Don't touch her!" The Doctor shouted to River, tugging me back by the arm.

"She's my best friend, Doctor. Who are _you_ to her?" River asked, smirking almost as if knowing he didn't have a response. The Doctor let go of me, but I walked over to Amy, who was still standing there in shock. There was no way River was my best friend. Sure, I don't know my personal future—but I know hers, and she ends up marrying the Doctor. I travel around with him, and apparently for a while if she knows me. Why would she be my best friend? Shouldn't she be mad at me for going around all of time and space with her husband?

"What's happening?" I asked Amy, even though I kind of knew. She shrugged and shook her head, while River responded for me.

"I just parked us."

"Parked us? We haven't landed." The Doctor argued.

"Of course we've landed. I just landed her." River responded, as the episode I was about to go through kicked in. This was the episode with the weeping angels, where Amy got one stuck in her eye or something.

I only had to think about it for a few seconds. I wasn't going to let that happen. What happened before with the daleks was my fault, and really, I hadn't changed a single thing. I made the bomb faster, but in the end I stopped it. There was no difference... but there had to be. I _had_ to be here for a reason. I mean, it's not like I would be stealing Amy's words if I were to get hurt instead of her, because no one would say the words in the first place. I would say something different, and Amy would say something different too, and wouldn't be in danger. Then hopefully I could be useful.

"But it didn't make the noise." The Doctor argued back, snapping me out of my thoughts.

"What noise?"

"You know, the..." The Doctor made a wheezing sound, trying to mimic the TARDIS noise.

"It's not supposed to make that noise. _You_ leave the brakes on." River Song pointed out.

"Yeah, well, it's a brilliant noise! I love that noise. Come along, Pond, Nova, let's have a look." The Doctor stomped towards the doors, but Amy and I just stood there looking at each other, both of us still unsure of what was happening.

"No, wait! Environment checks." River interrupted, looking back to the monitor.

"Oh, yes, sorry! Quite right. Environment checks," the Doctor mocked, sticking his head out the door. "Nice out."

River rolled her eyes and ignored him. "We're somewhere in the Garn Belt. There's an atmosphere. Early indications suggest..."

"We're on Alfava Metraxis, the seventh planet of the Dundra System. Oxygen-rich atmosphere, toxins in the soft band, 11-hour day, and... " The Doctor stuck his head out the door again, "chances of rain later."

"He thinks he's so hot when he does that," River murmured to Amy and I, shaking her head.

"How come you can fly the TARDIS?" Amy asked River, as the Doctor went to sit back in the pilot's chair again.

"Oh, I had lessons from the very best." River chirped.

The Doctor sat a little more smugly in his chair, smiling. "Well... yeah."

"It's a shame you were busy that day," River called to him. "Though Nova was the perfect teacher," she smiled to me, and I guessed she was probably just messing around. I didn't know how to do anything, so there's no way I actually could have taught her. River picked up her shoes that were hanging from the TARDIS monitor and walked over to the door. "Right then. Why did they land here?"

"They didn't land here." the Doctor interjected, getting up from his chair and following her. Amy and I looked to each other for a moment, and then decided to follow also.

"Sorry?" River asked.

"You should've checked the Home Box-- it crashed." The Doctor told her. As soon as River stepped outside, the Doctor slammed the door behind her and walked back over to the console.

Amy followed him back, but I stayed by the door and slowly opened it as quietly as I could, and went out next to stand next to River. In front of us was a giant smoking spaceship that had crashed into what looked like an old, stone building. A few areas were still on fire, debris scattered all around the beach, the sunlight faintly glowing through the cloudy sky.

"I know," River called to me, not turning her back, even though I was standing behind her.

I walked to her side and crossed my arms. "Know what?"

"I know that you are a Time Lord, and that you remember Gallifrey but not really, because you still jump back to a different universe where you work at Area 51 as a scientist named Scarlette and love a TV show which allows you to know all about the Doctor's adventures. I also know that you can't tell him." She recited to me.

"Have you been practicing that?" I asked her, both in defense and for the fact that it honestly sounded rehearsed.

She chuckled a little. "You warned me that this was going to be my first time meeting you. And I think there's something you need to know."

"What?" I asked, intrigued at the fact that I informed her ahead of time, and the fact that she didn't seem to totally hate me for flying around with her husband. And also, her in general.

She sighed and finally turned to face me and looked me right in the eye. "The threat of Prisoner Zero is real, very real. You have to be careful, Nova. When you were captured in its dream state it implanted some sort of triggered virus in your brain that it can control, all about the Doctor. You can't tell him anything. Zero and the Silence don't care much about anyone else, but you can't tell me or Amy or anyone else what's going to happen either, because the timelines would mess up far too much. Do you understand?" she asked me, very seriously.

"Wait, and the silence?" I worried, paying close attention to every single word she was saying.

She shook her head, almost at herself, for the slip-up, but this was River Song. Maybe it was on purpose. "Yes, Nova. That's why Prisoner Zero did that in the first place, a deal with the silence."

Now I was shaking my head. "But how could the silence have even known... that doesn't make any sense!" I complained, trying to urge her to reveal more so I could figure it out.

Suddenly, her tone became very harsh. "Nova, I've already said too much. I can't tell you anything else. You can't say anything, understand?"

"Yes, _mom_." I replied mockingly, even though I was terrified at the information. I guessed as much about the timelines and knew that the Prisoner Zero did something weird after I choked on the Starship UK, but I didn't know how serious it was, and I wasn't really sure if it was just me. Behind me, I faintly heard the sound of the TARDIS doors opening and knew that Amy and the Doctor had just stepped out.

River Song grinned at me. "Oh, look at you! You're adorable this young-- sarcasm as a defense mechanism. It's cute."

"I−" I shut my mouth as soon as I opened it, realizing I was about to retort with sarcasm. Maybe River Song really did know me, but I still hardly believed that she was my best friend. "What am I when I'm older, then?"

"Sexy," she chided smugly. If I had been sipping water, I probably would have spit it out right now. River told the Doctor that I was her best friend, but neither of us knew her that well. I knew how she was supposed to be, what she went through and what she was going to go through, but I knew absolutely nothing about what my relationship with her was, or is, or will be. She could easily be lying, but I couldn't really tell if it mattered.

"What caused it to crash? Not me." River continued, announcing to the Doctor behind her.

"Nah, the airlock would've sealed seconds after you blew it. According to the Home Box, the warp engines had a phase-shift. No survivors." The Doctor recalled, walking up to us as Amy stood cautiously behind.

"A phase-shift would have to be sabotage. I did warn them." River shrugged.

"About what?" I asked her, but she only raised her eyebrows.

River began typing in the small device she was holding. "Well, at least the building was empty. Aplan temple. Unoccupied for centuries." I almost shuddered at her statement. That building is very much occupied.

"Aren't you going to introduce us?" Amy asked the Doctor.

"Amy Pond, Professor River Song." The Doctor introduced. "Nova, do you know her?"

I looked to River for help, and she raised her eyebrows at me. I guess it was my decision. "Uhh... spoilers?" I tried, and River Song laughed, while the Doctor seemed to have a concentrated look on his face.

"Oh, you _are_ cute. But it's not your thing, darling." River objected.

"Then what is my thing?" I asked. Saying ' _spoilers_ ' seemed like an easy cheat.

"Usually it's something like ' _Uhh_ ' or ' _Umm_ ' and then changing the subject. Works just fine." She assured me, before turning back to the Doctor and gasping. "Wait, I'm going to be a Professor some day, am I? How exciting!" She chuckled, as the Doctor winced at letting his mistake slip. "Spoilers," she winked to me, before getting back to her device.

"Yeah, but who is she and how did she do that? She just left you a note in a museum!" Amy tried whispering to the Doctor, but River and I heard her perfectly. The Doctor held his finger to his lips and made a s _hh_  sound to Amy, before walking away.

"Two things are always guaranteed to show up in a museum: The Home Box of a category four starliner and, sooner or later," River turned to Amy, "him. It's how he keeps score."

"I know!" Amy laughed, and I smiled a little too.

"Hilarious, isn't it?" River agreed.

The Doctor walked up behind us with a fake stressed laugh. "Ha ha ha ha, I'm nobody's taxi service! I'm not gonna catch you every time you feel like jumping out of a spaceship." The Doctor pointed, scolding River.

She closed her eyes and shook her head, smirking. "And you are so wrong." The Doctor turned away, but River continued. "There's a thing in the belly of that ship that can't ever die."

The Doctor looked to her with an intrigued look, and River raised her eyebrows before turning back to Amy and I. "Now he's listening!" she noted, before holding up her device to her ear like a phone. "You lot in orbit yet? Yeah, I saw it land. I'm at the crash site. Try and home in on my signal." She walked away as she continued talking to them, and then turned back, holding her device up. "Doctor, can you sonic me? I need to boost the signal so we can use it as a beacon."

The Doctor begrudgingly pulled out his sonic screwdriver from his inner jacket pocket and used it on River's communication device. Amy looked smug throughout the entire process, the Doctor looked angry, River looked confused, and I tried my best to mask my worry and act normal.

"Ooh, Doctor! You soniced her!" Amy gushed mockingly.

"We have a minute. Shall we?" River called, pulling out her diary from her bag and opening it. "Where were we up to? Have we done the Bone Meadows?"

"What's the book?" Amy asked.

"Stay away from it." The Doctor ordered.

"I like the TARDIS design." I commented, trying to lighten up the mood as much as I could.

"What is it though?" Amy asked again, everyone ignoring my comment, yet again.

"Her diary," The Doctor said.

"Our diary," River corrected. "Nova's, too, technically. You really should keep one, dear. Out of all of us."

"Does it look like I have time? I barely have time to eat!" I complained, pulling out saltwater taffy from my pocket again and unwrapping it.

"It's her past, my... future. And I guess now it's Nova's too. Time travel. We keep meeting in the wrong order," he explained to Amy.

In the distance, four columns of dust gathered, and four soldiers in desert camouflage appeared from them. The commander walked up to River Song. "You promised me an army, Doctor Song."

"No. I promised you the equivalent of an army. This is the Doctor, and Nova." The Doctor gave a lighthearted salute, and I just smiled and waved at the man, still awkwardly chewing my saltwater taffy.

He shook both of our hands. "Father Octavian, sir, ma'am. Bishop, second class. 20 clerics at my command. The troops are already in the drop ship and landing shortly. Doctor Song was helping us with a covert investigation. Has Doctor Song explained what we're dealing with?"

"Doctor, what do you know of the Weeping Angels?" River asked calmly, as the Doctor stared back at her with a tense look on his face.

I looked at the men before me, and then at Amy, and I knew what I had to do.


	12. Time of Angels (pt 2)

The Doctor, Amy, and I strode through the camp the soldiers had set up at the beach. It was nighttime now, and we were following Father Octavian, who was explaining some things to us. "The angel, as far as we know, is still trapped in the ship. Our mission is to get inside and neutralize it. We can't get through up top, we'd be too close to the drives. According to this," Octavian pulled out what seemed to be a handheld tracking device as we paused by a desk, "behind the cliff face, there's a network of catacombs leading right up to the temple. We can blow through the base of the cliffs, get into the entrance chamber, then make our way up."

"Oh, well that sounds fun." I remarked sarcastically. I was extremely worried about the weeping angels, and what I was about to get myself into, but there was no way I wasn't going to do it. I had already made the promise to myself. The daleks getting away last time was kind of my fault, after all, and I could never tell anyone... nor did I want to.

This was the least I could do.

"Fun, ma'am?" Father Octavian questioned me, not sensing my sarcasm. Maybe they didn't have it in the 51st century.

"Dark catacombs. So fun." I stated blandly anyway, staring out into the dark night ahead of us.

"Technically, I think it's called a Maze of the Dead." Father Octavian corrected me. I refused to close my eyes in fear, like I tended to do, and took a deep breath, staring out into the darkness. I almost forgot about that part. Almost.

"You can stop any time you like." The Doctor commented, noticing my distress. Father Octavian was called away by some soldiers, and he excused himself while the Doctor pulled out his sonic and scanned the equipment on the desk.

I refused to stop staring into the dark abyss. I did not want to think about the stupid thing I was about to do anymore, and the darkness was pretty distracting.

Amy sat up on the table. "You're letting people call you ' _sir_ '. You never do that. So, whatever a weeping angel is, it's really bad, yeah?"

"Now that's interesting," the Doctor commented, ignoring Amy and playing with some scanner that kept beeping. "Nova, you shouldn't have gone out there." He said to me. I could feel him staring at me, but I refused to look back, practicing my not blinking on the black abyss. Maybe if I closed one eye at a time it would work better, like winking back and forth. Or maybe I could squint. Does squinting work? My eyes would probably take longer to dry up that way...

"Nova?" Amy asked me this time, cutting into my thoughts.

I suddenly snapped my head towards her, forcing myself to look away from the darkness. "Huh? What-- sorry, lost in thought." I casually recovered, moving to sit on the desk next to Amy.

Amy looked at me skeptically for a moment before the Doctor turned to her. "You're still here. Which part of 'w _ait in the TARDIS till I tell you it's safe_ ' was so confusing?"

"Ooh, are you all Mister Grumpy Face today?" Amy mocked, making a fake grumpy face towards him, but the Doctor was dead serious.

"A Weeping Angel, Amy, is the deadliest, most powerful, most malevolent life form evolution has ever produced, and one is trapped inside that wreckage and I'm supposed to climb in with a screwdriver and a torch-- and assuming I survive the radiation, and the whole ship doesn't blow up in my face-- do something clever which I haven't actually thought of yet. That's my day, that's what I'm up to. Any questions?"

Amy mockingly glared at him. "Is River Song your wife?" She asked playfully, killing the Doctor's serious mood. "Because, I don't know, she's Nova's best friend, but the way she talks to you, I've never seen anyone do that. She's kinda like, you know, ' _Heel, boy!_ ' Though, there is something off about it..." Amy trailed.

"Yes." The Doctor nodded with a pause. "You're right. I am definitely Mister Grumpy Face today."

River Song stuck her head out of the trailer then. "Doctor! Nova! Father Octavian!"

I got up and ran into the trailer with River, and she looked at me strangely. "Are you alright?" she asked. When all I did was stare at the grainy black-and-white screen of the weeping angel with its back turned instead of respond, River continued. "Oh no, I know that look. Are you going to do something stupid?"

Now it was my turn to look at her strangely. It seems she really did know me well. All I could do was shrug in response, because in all honesty, I was starting to have second thoughts.

River shook her head and laughed. "What are we going to do with you?"

I looked at the screen again, letting myself blink and not seeing it move, and remembered what Amy did to shut off the weeping angel. I knew what to do, but I also knew that certain things had to happen, even if it wasn't to the same person. I was concentrated on the screen so much, I didn't even notice when the Doctor and Amy joined us.

"What do you think?" River asked the Doctor, as he walked up to the screen. "It's from the security cameras in the Byzantium vault. I ripped it when I was on board. Sorry about the quality-- it's four seconds, i've put it on loop."

"Yep, it's an angel." The Doctor confirmed. "Hands covering its face."

"You've encountered the Angels before?" Father Octavian asked him.

"Once, on Earth, a long time ago. But those were scavengers, barely surviving." The Doctor recalled nonchalantly, and I finally tore my eyes from the screen to look at him. I knew exactly what he was talking about. It was strange, because when I was watching this as an episode, I didn't remember him saying that. But now that he's right here in front of me, I remember Martha and Sally Sparrow and the 10th Doctor in 1969. The man in front of me, studying the screen with crossed arms, wasn't just 11-- he was really the Doctor.

With that thought in mind, I breathed a little easier. If I couldn't get myself out of the mess I was about to get into, and neither could Amy or River, then the Doctor definitely could.

"But it's just a statue." Amy pointed out, not seeing the threat.

"It's a statue when you see it." River corrected.

Amy pulled me back a little, while the Doctor asked River where the statue came from. "What does that mean, it's a statue when you see it?" she asked me, whispering.

I looked to the Doctor and River, who seemed to be discussing too intently to pay attention to us at this point, so I decided to explain it to her. "When you're looking, they can't move, because they're quantum locked. So when you look at them, they literally don't exist, and turn to stone. When you aren't looking, they aren't stone, and they can move around and have the power to send people back in time, because that's kind of like... their food. When they send someone back in time, they feed off of all the days they were supposed to have. Meanwhile the victims live to death in a different time period."

Amy began smiling, and I realized that the Doctor and River went quiet behind me. "I get it!" she exclaimed.

"How did you know that?" The Doctor asked me.

I looked to River, and she grinned at me mischievously, as if she already knew what I was going to say. I shrugged. "I know how stuff works."

"She's a scientist." River added, and I found myself smiling also. I tended to tell people that a lot, too, especially back in the real world when people questioned how a young girl knew so much about astrophysics. Even before I was officially a scientist, my best friend Deevia in high school would call me one jokingly every time I got exited over something I'd learned.

Meanwhile, Amy seemed excited at learning this new information. "So, what happens if they stare at each other?"

"They die." The Doctor finished bluntly, walking out of the trailer, River following him out with a device in her hand. Amy stayed inside, and I knew that this was it. I wanted to tell Amy to go out and tell River I was going to do the stupid thing now, but I was afraid that the weeping angel would hear. Could weeping angels even hear? I couldn't remember anything from my locket about the weeping angels, so everything I knew about them, I knew from the show.

I looked around the mess of supplies scattered around the desks for a paper and something to write with, and thankfully, I found someone's notes.

I took the paper and scribbled a quick note for her and handed the paper to Amy. "What's this? Passing notes?" She asked me.

I shook my head. "I need you to go out there and give this to River." I folded the paper and shoved it in her hand this time.

"She's just right out there, you know." She stated wearily. I took her by the shoulders and spun her around towards the door.

"I know, but I need to be here."

Amy gave me one last worried look before shrugging and turning out the door.

**888**

"I found this. Definitive work on the Angels. Well, the only one. Written by a madman, it's barely readable, but I've marked a few passages." River Song told the Doctor, handing him an old book. The Doctor quickly flipped through the pages and finished reading it in a matter of seconds.

"Hmm. Not bad, bit slow in the middle. Didn't you hate his girlfriend? No, hang on, wait, wait, wait!" The Doctor sniffed the book as Amy approached them, puzzled.

"Did you just read the entire book like that?"

"Yes," He replied, with an obvious tone to his voice. "But this book is wrong! What's wrong with this book? It's wrong." He figured rapidly.

"Oh, it's so strange when you go all baby-face. You don't know who I am yet, do you?" River smirked at the Doctor, observing him as he examined each page of the book slowly, sniffing it and feeling it. Thanks to Nova's warning from the future, River was able to figure out that this was early for the Doctor, also.

"How do you know who I am? I don't always look the same. And how do you know Nova?" He asked her, while still intently studying the book.

"Nova is a different story," she raised her eyebrows and sighed, getting a little distracted at the memory. "But I've got pictures of all your faces. You never show up in the right order though. I need the spotter's guide..."

"—Pictures. Why aren't there pictures?" The Doctor realized, after listening to only half of River's sentence.

Amy shook her head at him and tapped River on the arm, handing her the note Nova gave her. "Dr. Song, a message."

**888**

When I turned back to the angel, its face was already uncovered. When I turned to grab the remote control to the monitor, I looked back to see it was already facing me with its arms open.

"Okay," I said aloud, still not too sure whether or not the angel could hear me. "I really hope this works."

I pointed the remote at the screen and turned it off at a random point, and sure enough the monitor only shut down for just a second to blink back to life, the angel still staring at me. I fought to keep my eyes open and did the one thing that no one should do when facing a weeping angel, but I knew that I had to, or else things wouldn't work out right. I was already making a stretch by taking Amy's place in this trailer, so if I didn't get affected the same way she did, the timelines might turn out to be so different that more people would get hurt than what the universe had originally planned. I was doing this in the first place because I planned for less people to get hurt, so I couldn't mess up.

I mean, I guess technically I was already messing up, but getting affected the way Amy did would probably make it less messed up.

It definitely felt different here than it did at my job. Sure, I didn't exactly join Area 51 until I graduated high school, but my whole life, my dad had been teaching me little things that I didn't think were unusual to learn at the time. He taught me computer coding in 6th grade. I knew four languages. All my science courses were as advanced as they could possibly be while still being in high school, and eventually I came to love the subject so much, I took extra classes at a local community college. So by the time I had joined Area 51, I had already completed half of the necessary training.

The second half was the part I wish I wasn't so good at. The second half was really what Dylan did. He went out and stole things from people, and sometimes we had to take actual people who have been infected by something potentially alien and run a ton of different tests on them, torturing them until they couldn't take it, and returning them to their homes in a fragile state with all the resources we could possibly provide them with. It was awful. Sure, I've only had to do that twice in all my years of working so far, but I hated it every time. I would have nightmares about it for weeks on end, and the guilt would eat away at me until two months later when I got the report of all the things the government had given them as compensation, even though they didn't know they were getting it from us.

It was absolutely ridiculous. They would be tortured and not remember anything afterwards except the pain, and when we returned them in their horrible condition, they'd spontaneously win the lottery and move into a brand new house. It wasn't enough-- it was never enough after everything we took from them, but according to the directors, it was all they could do. It wasn't enough, but it had to be, or else none of us would be able to live with ourselves. I've tried to stop it over and over, complaining to Professor Zodiac to see if there was any other option, pulling up presentations and papers to show to him to send to the directors to prove that we didn't have to do it, that maybe there was another way. Of course, there never was. Someone had to do it, so the directors forced us to— the people in charge of us who we mostly didn't even know.

Sure, I don't have to kill anyone, but I have to do things that make scars in people they may never heal from. All the good work I did, and I got nothing. Then a test subject comes around—and the other scientists in my group tell me if I do it, they'll listen to me. If I press the button, they'll read my paper, they'll stop ignoring me, they'll analyze my results. I knew that they wouldn't— they just didn't want to carry the burden of being the one to induce all that torture on an innocent person. Of course I did it anyway, both times. All I had to do was press a few buttons, but each time I did it, I swore I would make a change. I did it in the name of everyone else—of all the cowards who would rather have the weakest vessel beaten then take the blame.

If I didn't do it, one by one, they would be fired. It started at the top of the project, whoever was in charge until it was down to me, the very last resort. If I didn't press the button, the people who mistreated me would have their memories erased and end up homeless on the streets. It was a lose-lose situation, and they wanted me to do their dirty work, so painfully simple as flipping a switch, pressing a button. It was hard. It took nearly half an hour each time just to muster up the courage, glaring hard at the control panel, then back to the test subject, all while trying to ignore their cries of, _just do it already_ _!_ Until eventually I did.

Those two subjects—I still remembered their names, and every other detail from their profile. Watching them squirm around like worms, convulsing, swelling up, screaming for help.... it felt like I had strip them of their humanity, and turn them into a lab rat.

Sometimes, I feared that killing them would have been better, no matter how easy their life became afterwards. They still lived with the trauma. They still lived with fragments of painful memories they couldn't put together.

Maybe it was insane, but I felt that I could make up for it all in this universe. There were so many times in 51 where I wish I could go back and change something that I did just to do it differently, so it would hurt less or not at all, but I never could. Here, not only could I literally go back in time, I knew what was supposed to happen. If I tried hard enough, if I was really careful, maybe I could change things for the better.

I knew about all the deaths and heartbreaks to come, and I thought about them. I thought about how it would be worth it if I could change just one, and let myself stare into the eyes of the angel.

Maybe this is the universe's way of redemption.

**888**

"This whole book— it's a warning, about the Weeping Angels. So why no pictures? Why not show us what to look out for?" The Doctor ranted, still scanning through the book.

River took the note from Amy, expecting for it to be a message from a cleric, but realized it was written from Nova instead. "An image of an angel becomes an angel itself. AKA, whatever looks like a weeping angel turns into one," she read out loud.

The Doctor was listening carefully, not knowing who the note was from, until a thought struck him.

"Nova!" The Doctor exclaimed, running over to the trailer, realizing that the book was wrong and picture-lacking for a reason.

**888**

There are two faults to my stupid plan.

The first one is that pausing a video at the perfect moment is a lot harder than I thought while you weren't exactly looking at the time stamp.

The second one is that I have always sucked at staring contests, and I still do.

I blinked for just a split second, and suddenly the angel was out of the television standing just in front of me, looking slightly like a hologram, but still very real.

I jumped back. "Doctor!" I yelled his name first without even thinking about it, pointing the remote at the screen and clicking it rapidly over and over, not thinking about strategy.

Thankfully, I got a response. "Are you all right? What's happening?" I heard the Doctor worry from outside the trailer.

"Doctor? The angel came out of the screen! And it looks really mad!" I yelled to him, running over to the door and trying to open it, but of course, it was locked.

"Don't take your eyes off it!" He warned me.

I squinted my eyes a little and held out the remote again, this time not just crazily pressing the button, but actually paying attention to the time signature on the monitor. "I'm not!" I yelled back, "But I think I know how to stop it!"

I heard the Doctor's sonic whirring, and River and Amy joining him. "It's deadlocked!" I heard the Doctor exclaim.

"There is no deadlock!" River retorted.

"Yeah, instead there's a weeping angel!" I heard Amy shout. For some reason I was glad that she got the answer right out of all of them. It was the weeping angel that deadlocked the door.

Carefully, I stared at the time until the video froze on a small glitch, and pressed the off button. The angel became a grainy grey image, and then it went away as the monitor turned off. "I did it!" I shouted triumphantly. "The angel is gone!"

A few moments later the door opened, and Amy, River, and the Doctor came in. They all looked rushed and worried, and I turned back to them casually. "The angel wouldn't go away when I turned the monitor off, but I found a glitch." I explained, feeling just a little bit proud of myself, even if I didn't exactly have to come to the conclusion.

The Doctor smiled at me a little, and then hugged me urgently. "You're alright, you're okay," he repeated, rubbing my back. I felt like something jump-started in me when the Doctor touched me, like a tiny rush of adrenaline that assured me I could do this.

"Yeah, I-I'm fine." I lied, trying my best not to concentrate on how I felt nice and fuzzy in his arms, but on how I just let the angel enter into my soul, or something.

"Good... good." The Doctor finished, awkwardly releasing me from his hug and heading over to the monitor to scan the wires it was connected to.

"That was amazing!" River complimented me. "So it was here? That was the angel?"

"That was a projection of the Angel. It's reaching out, getting a good look at us. It's no longer dormant." The Doctor explained to us, before an explosion sounded.

"Doctor, Nova! We're through!" Father Octavian yelled to us from outside.

"Okay," The Doctor turned to us, "now it starts." He walked out of the trailer to Father Octavian. River and Amy followed, and I went after them, while rubbing at a prick I felt at the inner corner of my eye.

**888**

All of us climbed down a rope ladder into the main chamber of the Maze of the Dead. I pulled out my flashlight and looked around the cave like everyone else did.

"Do we have a gravity globe?" The Doctor asked Father Octavian.

"Grav globe!" He commanded his soldiers, and one of them tossed a sphere to him, which was then tossed to the Doctor.

"Where are we? What is this?" Amy asked, looking around with the flashlight.

"It's an Aplan moratorium. Sometimes called a Maze of the Dead." River told her. I looked around at all the muddled rock and endless darkness, and shivered. I haven't even been in this place a minute, and I already hated it.

"What's that?"

"Well, if you happened to be a creature of living stone..." the Doctor kicked the gravity globe, and it flew far up into the air, lighting up and revealing the large area and the thousands of stone statues we were surrounded by, "The perfect hiding place."

I gulped nervously and reached into my pocket, pulling out another saltwater taffy. No one really seemed to care about how much noise I was making taking it out of the wrapper, but River looked to me and chuckled a little. I gave her a look and ate it anyway. I needed all the stress relief I could get right now. I was the one with an angel inside me, but they didn't know that... yet.

"I guess this makes it a bit trickier." Father Octavian observed. "A stone angel on the loose amongst stone statues. A _lot_ harder than I'd prayed for."

"A needle in a haystack." River remarked.

"A needle that looks like hay," The Doctor continued, "A hay-like needle. Of death. A hay-alike needle of death in a haystack of, er, statues... No, yours was fine."

"Right. Check every single statue in this chamber. You know what you're looking for. Complete visual inspection. One question— how do we fight it?" Father Octavian asked.

"We find it, and hope." The Doctor responded, walking off further into the cave, Amy following. I followed just a little, but paused to hear Octavian grab River by the arm.

"He doesn't know yet, does he? Who and what you are. Nova seems a bit off, also. She's not the same girl who broke out," Father Octavian observed, speaking in a warning tone.

"It's too early in his time stream. Nova knows who I am, but... she doesn't know _herself_." River whispered to him.

I continued walking on, following Amy and the Doctor, knowing I shouldn't hear the rest of it. I didn't even want to think of what he could have meant by ' _broke_ _out_ '.

I rubbed at my eye, and felt sand fall through my fingers.

**888**

_I fell to the ground, but this time it was worse than all the others. I was wet, and the ground was sand, so it stuck to me. "I can't do it anymore! I just can't!" I shouted, desperate, heaving on the floor, trying to wipe the sand from my eyes with the parts of my arm that weren't also covered in sand. I didn't even have to look up to know he was crossing his arms._

_"It's one or the other. You stay down and you lose, or get up and win the war," his words were encouraging, but his tone was hardly motivational. The grumble to his voice startled me into sitting up._

_"It's not like that. I can fail standing up," I pointed out. Just because you get up doesn't mean you win. I've been here all day, and I was sick of it. The only reason we were going through this anyway wasn't because he believed having the ability to defend yourself was noble and a young women is no exception to the rule, or whatever nonsense he was trying to justify himself with. No, he was doing this because he trusted the words of the prophet too much, even though he claimed he didn't. Why else would he be talking about a war that hasn't happened yet?_

_"No, you fall again. Then you rise again," he hit my knee with his staff. "Up!"_

_I sighed, and stood up._

_Maybe that's the secret. As long as you're standing, well, you aren't losing yet._

**888**

"You alright?" River asked me, just as Amy walked back to us also.

"I'm fine." I assured her, a little too quickly, if the look she was giving me was anything to go on. She raised her eyebrows at me, but sighed, as if she already knew prodding me was a lost cause.

"What's a Maze of the Dead?" Amy asked us.

"Oh, it's not as bad as it sounds. It's just a labyrinth with dead people buried in the walls." River explained calmly, but Amy and I shot her a worried glance. Dead people buried in the walls, caves infested with millions of weeping angels, what was the difference anymore? Everything was making me worried. "Okay, that was fairly bad... Right, give me your arm." she said to Amy. River grabbed hold of her arm, pulling out a syringe. "This won't hurt a bit."

River gave Amy a shot, and Amy winced. "Ow!"

"There, you see. I lied. It's a viro-stabilizer. Stabilizes your metabolism against radiation, drive burn, anything. You're going to need it when we get up to that ship." River explained.

"Won't I need it too?" I asked.

"Nope. You're a Time Lord," she smiled, and I was stunned for a moment. I kept forgetting Time Lord biology wasn't the same as a human's.

Amy was looking at the Doctor intently as he scanned the rocks and statues just a few feet ahead of us. "So what's he like? In the future, I mean. Cause you know him in the future, don't you?"

"The Doctor? Well, the Doctor's the Doctor." River responded, because that was all she could really say.

"Oh, well that's very helpful. Mind if I write that down?" Amy replied sarcastically.

River ignored Amy's sarcastic comment and was staring at the Doctor smugly. "Yes, we are."

The Doctor didn't look up from his device. "Sorry, what?"

"Talking about you."

"I wasn't listening, I'm busy."

"Right," I commented. "It's the other way around." I told him, having figured out how the device works after seeing River poke around with it all day.

"Yeah." The Doctor turned the device the other way up and finally looked to us, and River raised her eyebrows at him.

"You're so his wife." Amy told River.

"Oh, Amy, Amy, Amy! This is the Doctor we're talking about. Do you really think it could be anything that simple?"

"Yep."

"You're good. Maybe the Doctor could be that simple. But do you think _Nova_ is that simple?" River asked, and she gave me a knowing glance before walking away to check on the Doctor's readings.

In the Doctor's universe that I knew, that answer was very different. That answer was about River being the Doctor's wife... when they saved the universe and fell in love. So what did it have to do with me?

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hm... what does it have to do with Nova? Anyway, sorry about that super depressing glimpse of Nova's past life as Scarlette. I really want to know what you think of it, and I hope that now her guilt complex and lack of confidence in her intelligence makes sense.


	13. Time of Angels (pt 3)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Big Question: Do you think Nova said 'Eleven' as the start of the countdown, or did he call the Doctor by his regeneration name? Dun dun DUN....

"Can you believe this? We're hunting statues," Christian complained as he slowly trudged into the small cave, his flashlight sweeping the area.

"Better than chasing lava snakes," Angelo retorted, shuddering at the memory.

"Actually, lava snakes weren't that bad," Christian remarked, as he moved his flashlight to see yet another statue. He continued on through the cave and out of Angelo's sight, the light on his rifle flickering.

Angelo, who didn't know what was happening anymore, heard something that sounded like... stone crashing, until he heard Christian again. "Who's there? Is someone there? Angelo?"

Christian turned his head back for just a second to call for Angelo again, and that was his grave mistake. "Angelo!" He called, but when he turned back, he was faced with the statue of an angry, hungry angel... who had just found some food.

His light went out.

Further back in the chamber, Angelo grew worried. "Christian, is that you?"

Angelo was just about to move again when his radio sparked to life. "Angelo, come and see this."

Normally, he would be relieved. His partner proved to be alive... but something about it just didn't feel right. It didn't really sound like something he would say, either. "What is it?"

"Just come and see it," Christian ordered over the radio, and that was when Angelo really got skeptical. This wasn't like Christian. Usually he was straight to the point.

"It's not a school trip. Just tell me."

"No, really, come and see."

Angelo sighed and followed anyway... his light going out before he realized it.

**888**

I was still standing with Amy while the Doctor and River went over readings, until a machine gun was fired. I was the first to run towards the noise, the Doctor, River, and Amy following.

It was a young cleric who fired the gun, and he looked like he regretted it. "Sorry. Sorry, I thought... I thought it looked at me."

Father Octavian walked up to him. "We know what the Angel looks like. Is that the Angel?" He asked sternly.

"No, sir." The cleric responded apologetically.

"No, sir, it is not! According to the Doctor, we are facing an enemy of unknowable power and infinite evil. So it would be good, it would be very good, if we could all remain calm in the presence of decor." Father Octavian seethed, though I knew that the statue wasn't just decor. I glanced at it warily, knowing that it was really just a dying angel, but soon it wouldn't be. 

The cleric was right. It _did_ look at him.

"What's your name?" The Doctor asked him.

"Bob, sir."

"Ah, that's a great name. I love Bob," The Doctor smiled.

"It's a Sacred Name. We all have Sacred Names, they're given to us in the service of the Church." Father Octavian explained.

The Doctor walked between them. "Sacred Bob. More like Scared Bob now, eh?"

"Yes, sir." Bob responded politely.

"Ah, good. Scared keeps you fast. Anyone in this room who isn't scared is a moron. Carry on." The Doctor left.

"We'll be moving into the maze in two minutes. " Octavian announced, before turning to give an order to Bob. "You stay with Christian and Angelo. Guard the approach."

I froze at that order. I remembered that an Angel would kill Bob, and they would speak through him. I thought hard, but here wasn't a way I could stop it, because otherwise the angels wouldn't have a way of talking to us, and then we'd be in even more trouble. It felt wrong to bargain like this.

I began nervously fiddling with the taffy wrapper, and River walked up to me. "Nova, I know what you're thinking... but you can't save everybody. There are some things you can't fix." She pried the wrapper out of my hands and made me look at her. "I know that you're doing what you can. And sometimes there's _nothing_ you can do, Nova."

In this case, I thought, maybe there really wasn't much more I could do. I had already consumed the angel soul or something by staring into its eyes in the trailer. I didn't feel like it was enough, but just like River said, I knew that it had to be. 

"Okay," I nodded. River held out the wrapper back to me, but I only shook my head and took another one out of my pocket, earning a small smile from her.

"Isn't there a chance this lot's just gonna collapse? There's a whole ship up there." Amy worried, looking up.

"Incredible builders, the Aplans." River observed, admiring the architecture all around us.

"Had dinner with their chief architect once. Two heads are better than one." The Doctor remarked.

"You mean you helped him?" Amy asked.

"No, I mean he had two heads. That book, the very end, what did it say?" The Doctor asked River.

"Hang on," River told him, reaching to open her pack and take the book out.

"Read it to me."

"'What if we had ideas that could think for themselves? What if one day our dreams no longer needed us? When these things occur and are held to be true, the time will be upon us. The time of Angels.'"

**888**

"Are we there yet? It's a hell of a climb," Amy commented, trekking along from the back. I was at the front of us with some clerics, trudging up the stairs while anxiously folding and unfolding the wrapper in my hands. At the moment, I was trying to be less anxious about the angels and more excited about the fact that I was in a giant cave in the future, looking around and absorbing every little detail, despite the fact that the beautiful walls I was admiring may or may not be filled with dead people.

"The maze is on six levels representing the ascent of the soul. Only two levels to go." River explained to her, trying to lift her spirits.

"Lovely species, the Aplans. We should visit them some time." The Doctor commented.

"I thought they were all dead?" Amy wondered.

"Well, probably not if you have a time machine," I replied, as we entered the next level. It was weird, being surrounded by dead people, and then thinking about going back to see them. The clerics I was next to began observing their surroundings.

I turned back to join River, and she still had a worried look on her face that I knew wasn't about me anymore. "Doctor, there's something. I don't know what it is... "

"Yeah, something wrong. Don't know what it is yet either, working on it." The Doctor assured us. I could have sighed of relief, because they were finally figuring it out, but angels were surrounding us, and the Doctor was losing his train of thought, rambling on about the Aplans again. 

"...Then they started having laws against self-marrying and what was that about? But that's the church for you. Erm, no offence, Bishop."

"Quite a lot taken, if that's all right, Doctor." Father Octavian replied, continuing walking. "Lowest point in the wreckage is only about 50 feet up from here. That way."

I groaned. This whole time I was nervous about the angels, freaking out about the fact that they were there, and the fact that I couldn't tell anyone they were there in the first place. Then they start getting it, but the Doctor distracts himself! Time lines be damned, I didn't care anymore. There was an angel staring me right in the face when I tapped the Doctor on the shoulder and decided it wouldn't hurt to give him a little hint. "Doctor, you should take a closer look at those statues. You said Aplans have two heads." I told him slowly, finally giving in just a little, having a hard time not telling everyone what was wrong.

The Doctor walked up to one closely with his torch, and his face fell. "Oh."

"What's wrong?" Amy asked.

"Pretty much everything," I replied, glad that I could finally worry freely.

"Oh," River realized, staring wide-eyed at the Doctor.

"Exactly," he responded.

"How could we not notice that?"

"Low perception-filter, or maybe we're thick."

"What's wrong, sir?" Octavian asked, worried.

"Nobody move. Everyone stay exactly where they are. Bishop, I am truly sorry. I've made a mistake and we are all in danger." The Doctor apologized, and everyone froze in fear.

"What danger?"

"The Aplans have two heads." I told him, almost proud of myself for figuring out that I could share that little hint, and nothing seemed to explode or anything.

"Yes, I get that. So?"

"So why don't the statues?" The Doctor observed, looking back for just a moment to find an empty space. "Everyone, over there. Just move, don't ask questions, don't speak." All of us moved over to the space, shining our lights in every which direction at the statues. "Okay. I want you all to switch off your torches."

"Sir?" Octavian questioned.

"Just do it," River commanded them, and they all switched off their lights one by one, until the Doctor's light was the only one on, shining at the statues directly in front of us, all of us standing behind him either confused, worried, or both. "Okay. I'm going to turn off this one too, just for a moment."

"Are you sure about this?" River asked. There was a slight pause.

"No," The Doctor replied honestly, but he switched off his torch anyway, for just a split second. When he turned it back on, the statues were facing us. Now we were sure they weren't Aplans.

"Oh my god! They've moved!" Amy yelled. The Doctor ran off and all of us followed.

"They're Angels. All of them!" The Doctor shouted back.

"But they can't be!" River shouted in disbelief.

"Clerics, keep watching them." The Doctor ordered. He walked back a little to see the statues in walking and crawling positions, reaching out for us like they were dying, which they probably were. "Every statue in this maze, every single one, is a Weeping Angel. They're coming after us!"

**888**

In a different chamber, Bob was still looking for Angelo and Christian, like he was ordered to.

"Bob, come and see this," Bob's radio sparked, and he realized it was Angelo's voice talking to him.

"Angelo?" he asked, only a little bit confused.

"Come and see what we've found."

"Are you with Christian? The Bishop said you'd be five minutes." Bob asked him, worried now. Something about this didn't sound right.

"I'm here, Bob. Come and see this," Angelo ushered gently.

Bob looked around a moment, but he didn't see anything but statues. "Where are you?"

"Through the arch, Bob. Honestly, you've got to come and see this."

Bob was really concerned now. It sounded like Angelo... but not really. "What have you found?"

"Come and see."

"No. What is it?" Bob asked him. Angelo was being absurd.

"Come and see," Angelo told him again. Bob gave up and walked through the doorway, wondering what he could possibly want. When the face of an angry angel statue appeared instead, he realized that it really wasn't Angelo speaking, but now it was too late.

**888**

"There was only one angel on the ship. Just one, I swear." River apologized. We had stopped for just a moment to look around.

Amy's face was scrunched in concentration, only the slightest hint of fear on her face. "Could they have been here already?"

"The Aplans, how did they die out?" The Doctor asked, trying to solve this.

"Nobody knows," River responded.

"Looks like we do now," I remarked.

Octavian was still skeptical. "They don't look like angels."

"And they're not fast. You said they were fast. They should have had us by now," Amy stated, looking for some hope.

"That's because they're dying. Look at them," I explained simply, telling her what I figured out before.

The Doctor nodded and looked closely at a statue that looked to be crawling on the floor. "Exactly. They're losing their form. They must have been down here for centuries, starving."

"Losing their image," Amy added.

"And their image is their power," he finished, before figuring it out. "Power," he stood up and snapped his fingers in realization. "Power!"

"Doctor?"

"Don't you see? All that radiation spilling out, the drive burn. The crash wasn't an accident− it was a rescue mission, for the Angels. We're in the middle of an army and it's waking up," The Doctor rambled, pacing back and forth.

River nodded. "We need to get out of here fast!"

Father Octavian spoke into his radio. "Bob, Angelo, Christian, come in, please. Any of you, come in!"

I closed my eyes in a mix of remembrance, guilt, and fear, knowing it was too late for them. "It's Bob, sir. Sorry, sir," He spoke back.

"Bob, are Angelo and Christian with you? All the statues are active. I repeat, all the statues are active!"

"I know, sir. Angelo and Christian are dead, sir. The statues killed them, sir."

The Doctor impatiently snatched the radio from Octavian. "Bob, Sacred Bob, it's me, the Doctor. Where are you now?"

Octavian was too shocked to be angry. "I'm talking to my−"

The Doctor held up a finger to Octavian, interrupting him. "Yeah, yeah, yeah, shut up!"

"I'm on my way up to you, sir, I'm homing on your signal," Bob replied in the radio.

"Well done, Bob. Scared keeps you fast, told you, didn't I? Your friends, Bob, what did the Angel do to them?" The Doctor asked.

"Snapped their necks, sir."

"That's odd. That's not how the Angels kill you, they displace you in time. Unless they needed the bodies for something."

Octavian took the radio back from the Doctor. "Bob, did you check their data packs for vital signs? We may be able to initiate a rescue plan−"

The Doctor pried the remote out of Octavian's grasp angrily. "Oh, don't be an idiot! The Angels don't leave you alive!" He tried to explain to him, before speaking into the radio. "Bob, keep running, but tell me, how did you escape?"

"I didn't escape sir, the angel killed me too," Bob replied, with not a hint of any real emotion in his voice, which seemed to make everything even worse. We all turned to give each other looks, but I knew mine was different. They were confused, but I knew what happened. After all, he did sound normal, but I knew that it wasn't even him talking anymore.

"What do you mean the angel killed you too?" The Doctor asked slowly, carefully.

"Snapped my neck, sir. Wasn't as painless as I expected but it was pretty quick, so that was something."

"If you're dead, how can I be talking to you?"

"You're not talking to me, sir. The angel has no voice. It stripped my cerebral cortex from my body and re-animated a version of my consciousness to communicate with you. Sorry about the confusion," Bob explained. Well, at least the politeness from his consciousness carried over... but it was heartbreaking at the same time. I noticed a flash of regret across Father Octavian's face, and could only imagine how he felt losing a team member.

"So when you say you're on your way up to us..."

"It's the angel that's coming, sir, yes."

The Doctor put the radio down and immediately got down to business. "No way out!" he panicked.

"Then we get out through the wreckage, go!" Father Octavian ordered, yet Amy, River and I still stood where we were.

"Go, go, go. All of you run!" The Doctor yelled. Amy and River started to move, but I still stayed.

"Doctor," Amy began, noticing he wasn't going to move.

"Yes, I'm coming, just go go go!" He told us again, but I refused to move away from him for a lot of reasons. Thankfully, he didn't protest when I didn't move after Octavian approached him. "Called you an idiot. Sorry, but there's no way we could have rescued your men," he apologized.

"I am sorry too," I offered. Even though I wasn't the one who called him an idiot or anything, I still felt like I could have done something. I probably could have.

"I know that, sir, ma'am. And when you've flown away in your little blue box, I'll explain that to their families." Father Octavian finished coldly, before walking off.

I took a deep breath, and remembered a promise I made to the Doctor, deciding I should tell him. "Doctor, it happened again, by the way. The... remembering thing."

He was holding his radio, about to speak into it, but then stopped to give me his full attention. "What did you see?"

"Someone was telling me to get up from the ground, like I was in training," I explained. Maybe just the images might have not led me to that conclusion, but somehow, along with seeing and hearing, part of what I was thinking at the time came to me too. I guess it was a Time Lord thing, and probably the reason why I completely immersed into the vision, not being able to pull myself out—no one being able to pull me out. It was like I completely stopped thinking, only stayed standing, almost like spontaneous sleepwalking.

He nodded, seeming to understand. "Right, training. I remember those. The Sisterhood of Pythia volunteered..." he seemed to trail off, lost in thought and remembrance.

I furrowed my eyebrows in confusion. "Sisterhood?" I thought out loud, "Are they all supposed to be girls, then? Because it was a man teaching me."

"A man?" he asked, a strange look crossing his face that I couldn't pinpoint.

I nodded. "Yeah."

He nodded, and I couldn't tell if the look on his face meant he was piecing more things together or becoming even more confused. The Doctor spoke into his radio again, so I stood off to the side and put my hand on a rail-like stone. "Angel Bob, which angel am I talking to? The one from the ship?"

"Yes, sir. The other angels are still restoring." Angel Bob replied.

"Ah. So the angel is not in the wreckage. Thank you." He hung up the radio and turned to me, before running off. "Don't wait for me, go! Run!"

I was just about to run when I looked down at my hand, and knew exactly what was happening all too well. "I can't," I told the Doctor softy, staring down at my hand that was stuck, at my hand that was stone. I knew, logically, that it wasn't really stone, but everything else in me was fighting against it, and I was terrified.

"Why not?" He asked me, coming back to try and help me.

"Look," I told him, staring down at my stone hand in fear. "My hand. It's stone."

The Doctor took out his flashlight and flashed it in my eyes, examining them. "You looked into the eyes of an angel, didn't you?"

"Um..." I was really starting to panic now, and gulped, "maybe?"

" _Nova._ "

"I'm sorry! I− I tried!" I retorted automatically, before realizing that the Doctor's tone didn't sound scolding. It sounded... heartbroken.

He grabbed me by the shoulders and began talking steadily, quickly, trying to get me to snap out of the illusion. "Listen. It's messing with your head. Your hand is not made of stone."

I looked back to my hand and not only saw that it was completely stuck, but I felt it, also. "It is. It is, look at it!"

"It's in your mind. I promise you. You can move that hand. You can let go."

I began struggling, relentlessly trying to pull myself away. "I'm trying!"

His light flickered as he steadied me by the shoulders again. "You can't panic. The Angel is gonna come and it's gonna turn this light off, and then there's nothing I can do to stop it. So do it, concentrate, move your hand."

I stared long and hard at my stone hand, blinking, trying to see it as my normal flesh hand, but I couldn't. "What if I can't?"

"Then we're both going to die."

I knew what he meant, and I definitely was not going to let that happen. I shook my head. "You're not going to die. _We're_ not going to die. I have to concentrate, right?"

The lights flickered and the angels moved slightly closer. "Yes. They'll kill the lights," the Doctor said.

"Okay, okay. I can do this. I think. Or at least I really, really hope," I rambled, staring and blinking at my hand, but it still wasn't working. The lights flickered again, and the angels got closer. Instinctively, I turned to stare at them.

"Keep your eyes on it. Don't blink," the Doctor advised me, while I continued yanking on my arm. Some part of me still believed it was stone, so it didn't work. My eyes were watering, staring wide-eyed at the angels.

"Flick my hand or something!" I told the Doctor, fearing that hitting my own hand wouldn't work, and then both of them would be stone. I couldn't completely remember what it was that freed Amy when this happened, but I knew it had to be the Doctor who did something.

"Brilliant!" I heard him exclaim, and I knew I was getting onto something when I told him to hit my hand. "Nova, you are very brilliant, and I am very sorry," he told me, before I felt something sharp and wet strike my hand, and yanked it back, holding it to my chest.

"Ow! Did you just bite me?"

"Yep, and you're alive!" The Doctor retorted, pointing his flashlight at the angels who were getting closer and closer.

"Now I have a mark! That's so gross!"

"Yeah, and you're alive, did I mention?" The Doctor reminded me again, pulling me behind him as he shined his light on the angels.

I pulled the Doctor back to the path where everyone else was. "Come on, Eleven."

His eyebrows furrowed as he grabbed my wrist and turned me around. "What did you say?"

"I said, come on!" I yelled, pulling him away from the angels behind us, both of us starting to run.

We arrived to everyone else just as a cleric came back from checking the passage. "The statues are advancing along all corridors. And sir, my torch keeps flickering," he reported to Father Octavian.

Octavian only kept looking around. "They all do."

"So does the gravity globe," River added.

"Clerics, we're down to four men. Expect incoming." Octavian informed them.

The Doctor caught up to them. "Yeah, it's the angels. They're coming. And they're draining the power for themselves."

"How do they even do that?" I asked, keeping an eye on an angel in the distance, but no one really acknowledged me. I was really curious to know how statues could turn off lights without touching them, mostly, because even when we weren't looking at them, they were still weak.

"Which means we won't be able to see them," Octavian realized.

"Which means we can't stay here," the Doctor finished, just as the lights shut off and on again, angels coming towards us from the distance.

Father Octavian jumped back. "There are two more incoming!"

River calmly approached the Doctor. "Any suggestions?"

Octavian looked up at the space ship. "The statues are advancing on all sides and we don't have the climbing equipment to reach the Byzantium."

All of them were focused on the space ship, but I was focused on the gravity globe. "What about that? How does that work? You throw it up there and it lights up, and then the gravity is fixed?"

"Nova,  _not_ now," River glared at me, before turning back to the Doctor. "There's no way up, no way back, no way out. No pressure, but this is usually when you have a really good idea."

"There is a way out. There's always a way out," I offered, mostly to myself, a little nervously, right when the lights shut off and on again.

"There's always a way out," The Doctor repeated, pulling out his radio as it sparked to life.

"Doctor? Can I speak to the Doctor, please?" Angel Bob asked over the radio. All of us looked around at every single angel, realizing how close they were, and how they were starting to look less deformed.

"Hello, Angels. What's your problem?" The Doctor asked.

"Your power will not last much longer, and the Angels will be with you shortly. Sorry, sir."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"There's something the Angels are very keen you should know before the end."

"Which is?"

"I died in fear."

The Doctor faltered a little at his words. "I'm sorry?"

"You told me my fear would keep me alive but I died afraid, in pain and alone. You made me trust you, and when it mattered, you let me down."

"What are they doing?" Amy whispered to River and I.

"They're trying to make him angry," River whispered back.

"I'm sorry, sir. The Angels were very keen for you to know that." Angel Bob responded. All of us were silent as we waited for his response.

A hard look crossed his face. "Well then, the Angels have made their second mistake, because I'm not going to let that pass. I'm sorry you're dead, Bob, but I swear to whatever is left of you, they will be sorrier."

"But you're trapped, sir, and about to die."

"Yeah, I'm trapped. Speaking of traps, this trap has got a great big mistake in it. A great big, whopping mistake!" The Doctor exclaimed, his excitement and confidence returning.

"What mistake, sir?"

The Doctor turned to Amy. "Trust me?"

"Yeah," she responded, knowing something big was about to happen.

"Trust me?" he asked River.

"Always," she told him, with a sincerity in her voice he didn't understand yet.

"Trust me?" He asked me. I was caught a little off guard by the question. I don't know why I didn't expect him to ask me. I thought about it for just a second, and realized that even if I didn't have any other choice, I would still trust him.

"Yes," I responded, swallowing hard, knowing what was about to happen to me.

He smiled and turned to Father Octavian and his men. "You lot-- trust me?"

"Sir, two more incoming!" A cleric shouted from the passageway he was observing.

Father Octavian nodded. "We have faith, sir."

"Then give me your gun," The Doctor asked him, and he complied. "I'm about to do something incredibly stupid and dangerous. When I do..." he jumped in place, as if demonstrating. "Jump."

"Jump where?" Octavian asked.

"Just jump, high as you can. Come on, leap of faith, Bishop. On my signal."

"What signal?"

"You won't miss it," he pointed the gun at the ceiling. "Nova?"

"Yeah?" I asked.

"This is how a gravity globe works." 

I smiled just a little. It felt good to know that he wasn't ignoring me before.

The Doctor's radio cracked to life in his pocket, and Angel Bob was there again. "Sorry, can I ask again? You mentioned a mistake?"

"Oh, big mistake. Huge. There's one thing you never put in a trap, if you're smart, if you value your continued existence, if you have any plans about seeing tomorrow, there is one thing you never, ever put in a trap."

"And what would that be, sir?"

"Me!" The Doctor shouted, shooting the gravity globe as it exploded.

 


	14. Flesh and Stone (pt 1)

When I opened my eyes again, there was a throbbing in my head. I looked around to see everyone was crouched down, recovering from whatever happened after the jump, except for the Doctor. "Up! Look up!" He instructed us, but I had no idea why, too busy trying to snap out of my daze.

"You okay?" River asked Amy and I.

I nodded and stood, looking up, realizing that it looked like everything had flipped, like gravity went backwards... and now I understood how a gravity globe worked.

Amy winced and held a hand to her head. "What happened?"

"We jumped," River stated, helping the rest of the team recover.

"Jumped where?"

The Doctor was moving around now, still rambling. "Up, up! Look up!"

"Well, basically, I think we jumped... up," I tried, observing my surroundings, trying to piece everything I knew about physics and gravity together in my head.

Amy furrowed her brows. "No we didn't."

The Doctor moved Amy a little out of the way as he knelt down and began using his sonic on an indent in the floor. "Move your feet."

Amy didn't really mind and kept scanning the area confusedly. "Doctor, what am I looking at? Explain."

I kept looking up and jumping in place, still not completely getting it. "Oh my god, physics is broken."

The Doctor stood up between Amy and I. "Nope, not broken, just artificial. The ship crashed with the artificial gravity still on. One good jump," he jumped himself as if in demonstration, "and up we fell. Shot out the grav-globe to give us an updraft, and here we are!"

The Doctor went back to using his sonic on the floor, and I followed him, crouching across from him. "So does the... grav globe, act like a, centrifugal force?"

"No, it's−" he paused and looked up at me, "Yes actually. How did you know that?"

I smiled, looking down at the circular door he just opened with his sonic. "It's like what they're trying to do in space. I keep telling them," I swung my legs over and fell into the ship door, landing upright on my feet, even though it didn't look that way from the top, smiling to myself in excitement. "Newtonian mechanics."

I looked around in the corridor as the Doctor jumped in behind me, and Amy and River peered over the hole. "Doctor!" Amy called, while River called for me instead.

"It's just a corridor. The gravity orientates to the floor. Now, in here, all of you-- don't take your eyes off the Angels. Move, move, move!" The Doctor used his sonic on a keypad to the side as one by one everyone piled into the corridor.

"Okay, men, go, go, go!" Octavian ordered, catching up to the Doctor. "The Angels, presumably they can jump up too?"

When everyone was inside, the door closed, and the Doctor removed his sonic from the keypad. "They're here. Now. In the dark, we're finished. Run!"

He ran for a large door behind him, but that one closed too, blocking our only escape. Lights were flickering, alarms were blaring, and tension was high. "This whole place is a death trap," Octavian yelled, but it sounded more like an observation than a complaint.

The Doctor turned his back to the escape door, all of us surrounding him as he tried to think of a way out. "No, it's a time bomb. Well, it's a death trap and a time bomb. And now it's a dead end. Nobody panic," A clattering was heard through the door we entered from, which we all knew to be the angels trying to get in. The Doctor's eyes widened at the sound. "Oh, just me then. What's through there?"

"Secondary flight deck," River responded, not taking her eyes off the exterior door the angels were trying to break in through.

Amy was breathing hard, trying her best not to panic. "Okay. So we've basically run up the inside of a chimney, yeah? So what if the gravity fails?"

"Let's not think about that," I tried.

The Doctor nodded, figuring Amy would keep pestering him for an answer. "I've thought about that."

"And?" She prodded.

"And we'll all plunge to our deaths. See, I've thought about it." He continued to try at the locked door, but nothing worked. "The security protocols are still live. There's no way to override them, it's impossible."

"How impossible?" River asked sternly, concentrating on some wires against the wall.

"Two minutes."

"Well, that's not completely impossible..." I tried. At least there was some time, but as soon as I spoke the words, the hum of the engine powered down, the way we came through re-opened, and the cavern above could be seen.

"The hull is breached and the power's failing," Father Octavian observed, and right on cue, the lights went off for just a second, but every second counted. When they turned on again, the arm of angel could be seen at the opening.

"Sir! Incoming!" A cleric warned us, as if it wasn't obvious.

The lights kept flickering, and none of us really knew what to do about it. Even the one person who might actually know seemed lost. "Doctor! Lights!" Amy panicked, while all the lights blacked out. Only a small blue hue filling the corridor from a few lights on the ground could be seen, but even then, we could barely see each other's faces in the darkness.

"River, Nova..." The Doctor said slowly, and I realized the whole team was staring at us while River was looking down, almost in regret.

"What?" I asked. They were all staring at us with slight awe and fear, and I had no idea why. When I asked for an explanation, I didn't know what I was expecting. But it definitely wasn't for the Doctor to cautiously step closer, and reach to me for a lock of my hair.

I looked to Amy with a slight glare that she didn't understand yet. Even if it... didn't happen yet, she was the first one to be so taken with my hair, and I still had no idea why, until the Doctor picked a few strands. I squinted at them and took them from him, and looked through all the strands in my hair, noticing that just a few of them were glowing faintly. I turned to look at River, hoping for an explanation, when I noticed that a few strands of her hair were glowing too. It was a subtle glow, so subtle it might not even be that strange, but of course—it was still a glow. With a few of River's curls faintly giving light, I noticed her swallow hard when I gave her a questioning look, and wondered again if she was really honest about being my best friend. 

I couldn't help but think that she was hiding something, something that had to do with me.

The lights came on again, and a group of angels were in the hall with us now, paused in a yelling position with arms reaching out to get us.

"Clerics, keep watching them," Octavian ordered his men.

"And don't look at their eyes. Anywhere else. Not the eyes. I've isolated the lighting grid. They can't drain the power now."

"Good work, Doctor."

The Doctor turned around this time. "Yes. Good. Good in many ways, good you like it so far..."

"So far?" Amy questioned, with a hint of worry in her voice.

The Doctor opened a small hatch of wires on the wall opposite River and began working on them. "Well, there's only one way to open this door. I guess I'll need to route all the power in this section through the door control."

"All the power?" I fidgeted, not at all liking where this was going.

Octavian obviously didn't really care at this point, and only wanted to make it out alive, not taking his eyes off the door as he responded. "Good, fine, do it."

The Doctor walked closer to the angels in front of us. "Including the lights. All of them. I'll need to turn out the lights."

River turned her head with a worry in her face, and so did Amy, but they both knew it was justified. It was the only way out, and Octavian figured it too. "How long for?"

"Fraction of a second, maybe longer. Maybe quite a bit longer."

"Maybe?"

"I'm guessing. We're being attacked by statues in a crashed ship, there isn't a manual for this!" The Doctor ran back to sonic the door.

Amy stood unmoving, glaring at him hard. "Doctor, we lost the torches. We'll be in total darkness."

"Well, there's the glow-y hair," I tried, hating how I felt so helpless in the situation.

The Doctor finished with the door and turned to Amy. "No other way!" He explained frantically, before turning to Octavian. "Bishop?"

Octavian only shook his head and approached River who was leaning against the wires. "Dr. Song, I've lost good Clerics today. You trust this man?" His tone was almost condescending, but he was helpless, and the Doctor seemed to be the only one who might know a way out.

The Doctor approached them, giving River a calculated look, curious about her response. River looked at Father Octavian sternly, almost seeming afraid to look anywhere else. "I absolutely trust him."

"He's not some kind of madman then?"

There was a slight pause before she responded, "I absolutely trust him."

The Doctor grinned at her, patting her shoulder and turning to the door again. "Excuse me."

Amy went back with him, but I stood right where I was. Maybe whatever Octavian said could give me a clue about my future. About who I was, or... will be.

"I'm taking your word, because you're the only one who can manage this guy on our team. But that only works so long as he doesn't know who you are, and the girl doesn't know who she is. You cost me any more men, and I might just tell him both. Understood?"

River nodded. "Understood."

Bishop sighed. "Okay Doctor, we've got your back." He must have noticed the cautious look I was giving him, because he smiled and pat my shoulder, but I only flinched. What is it that I become?

"Bless you, Bishop," The Doctor responded from the escape door. I joined them again, hoping I could help somehow. He asked Amy and I to press a few buttons and such while Octavian continued to give orders to his men.

"Amy, Nova, when the lights go down, the wheel should release. Spin it clockwise, four turns." The Doctor instructed us, going back to the panel of wires.

I nodded. "Ten."

"No, four, four turns," the Doctor corrected me, but I didn't know why.

I nodded again, "Yeah, okay," I responded nervously.

"Ready!" The Doctor shouted, placing his sonic in the circuit.

Octavian nodded. "On my count then. God be with us all. Three... two...one."

The lights went out. 

"Fire!"

The clerics opened fire on the angels, the flashes of light they were making showing they were slowly advancing, closer and closer to us. Amy and I began turning the huge wheel while the Doctor and River did whatever it is they were doing with the wires.

"Doctor, quickly!" River rushed.

"It's opening, it's working!" Amy shouted, getting the door open enough for her, River, and I to slip through.

"Fall back!" Octavian ordered, and one by one the clerics moved through the doorway that seemed to orderly for chaos followed by Octavian and the Doctor. In the hallway, the Doctor soniced another panel, opening another doorway that led to what looked to be the ship's control room.

Amy, River and I rushed behind him to the panel. "Doctor!" Amy shouted, noticing that the angels were turning the wheel on the supposedly locked door, but Octavian attached a small device to the door that stopped it.

I turned my head and walked closer to the door, trying to look at the device. "What's that?"

Octavian seemed proud and assured. "Magnetizes the door. Nothing could turn that wheel now."

The Doctor raised his eyebrows, continuing to type on the screen in front of him. "Yeah?"

The wheel slowly began to turn again, and I jumped back. It appeared that they were struggling to get it open, but nonetheless, they were still getting it open.

"Dear God!" Octavian gasped.

"Ah, now you're getting it!" The Doctor fiddled around with the control board, pulling wires here and there. "You've bought us time though, that's good. I am good with time."

Another door wheel started spinning, causing another worried 'Doctor!' from Amy. "Seal that door. Seal it now!" Octavian ordered, and his men put the devices on the doors again, then stood in position with their guns aimed at it.

"Doctor, how long have we got?" Octavian asked.

I ran back to the Doctor's side, trying to make sense of what he was doing. "Five minutes, max," he guessed.

"Nine," I said, in a voice that was eerily calm, nearly sounding automated.

The Doctor turned to me sharply. "Five," he repeated.

"Uh, yeah, five," I assured him.

"Why'd you say nine?" he asked me, looking at me worriedly now.

There was no denying it now, the angel in my soul was really there, but I truly didn't remember saying nine. "I... didn't say nine."

"Yes you did, I heard you," Amy confirmed.

I shook my head. "No I didn't."

"We need another way out of here," River interrupted, looking around at the slowly moving doors.

"There isn't one." Octavian responded bitterly.

"Yeah, there is, course there is. This is a galaxy class ship, goes for years between planet-falls. So," The Doctor snapped. "What do they need?"

River turned to him sharply, gasping. "Of course!"

"Of course what? What do they need?" Amy asked, not catching on.

I leaned over to her. "I think they need air?" I tried, but she gave me the strangest look, so I turned away.

"Can we get in there?" Octavian asked. Apparently he understood what was going on too.

The Doctor turned to face the wall behind him. "Well, it's a sealed unit, but they must have installed it somehow..." he pressed against the wall. "This whole wall should slide up. There's clamps. Release the clamps!" He rolled some equipment that was blocking the wall out of the way and used his sonic on some parts built into it.

Amy was still staring at the wall confusedly, trying to figure it out. "What's through there? What do they need?"

"They need to breathe," River responded, and Amy turned to me, giving me another look again with a surprised 'huh'.

The Doctor stood back as the metal wall he was working on slowly rose up, revealing a natural-looking scenery of hundreds of trees and dirt.

Amy was shocked, stepping closer. "But that's... It's a..."

"It's an oxygen factory," River finished for her, but Amy wanted to come to her own conclusions.

"It's a forest."

"Yeah, it's a forest, it's an oxygen factory," River tried explaining.

"And, if we're lucky, an escape route." The Doctor reminded us.

I blinked, in awe. No matter what technical name River gave it, it was still a forest in a spaceship. "Wow," I took a deep breath. "Eight."

"What did you say?" River asked me.

"Wow?" I responded, kind of in question.

I turned to Amy, but she only shrugged. The Doctor clapped his hands together. "Is there another exit? Scan the architecture, we don't have time to get lost in there."

"On it!" Octavian called, stepping into the forest. "Stay where you are until I've checked the Rad levels."

"But trees! On a spaceship?" Amy asked the Doctor.

I laughed. "Oxygen. I can't believe it!"

The Doctor smiled. "Oh, more than trees, way better than trees, not just oxygen. You're going to love this." The Doctor stepped into the forest and walked up to a tree, pulling a piece of bark open to reveal circuits inside. "Tree Borgs. Trees, plus technology. Branches become cables, become sensors on the hull. A forest sucking in starlight, breathing out air. It even rains. There's a whole mini-climate. It is an eco-pod running through the heart of the ship," The Doctor jumped back to us with a grin on his face. "A forest in a bottle, on a space ship, in a maze. Have I impressed you girls yet?"

Amy chuckled, and I did too. 

"Seven."

"Seven?" The Doctor asked me, joining us back in the flight deck, standing only a few inches away from me.

"What?" I asked, hoping it didn't sound too terrified. I had to keep telling myself that this was for Amy, and there was no way back. I also kept telling myself that maybe if I ignored the whole thing it would go away.

"You said seven," the Doctor observed, studying my face closely.

I stepped back a little under his intense gaze, not really sure if I wanted him to see what was in my eyes. "I didn't say seven," I denied stubbornly.

The Doctor was still studying me with a new wonder and a slight protectiveness, but River was eyeing me as if this had happened before. She was looking at me with her arms crossed, as if she knew that whatever happened, it was because of me. "Yes, you did,"

I shook my head, and then Amy was looking at me suspiciously. "You did, though."

"I didn't, okay? I don't remember saying anything. I _didn't_ say anything," I defended, hugging myself almost in recoil, feeling everyone's eyes on me. I turned back to the forest at the sound of Father Octavian's voice.

"Doctor! There's an exit, far end of the ship, into the Primary Flight Deck," he called to us, from somewhere inside the forest.

The Doctor turned for just a second, "Good, that's where we need to go," he approved, before staring back at me. Instinctively, I leaned back.

"Plotting a safe path," Octavian informed us, but the Doctor still refused to look away from me.

"Quick as you like," he called back to him, still trying to read my eyes, until his radio whirred.

"Doctor? Excuse me. Hello, Doctor? Angel Bob here, sir."

The Doctor pulled out the radio from his pocket and moved to sit in the command chair. "Ah. there you are, Angel Bob. How's life? Sorry, bad subject..."

"The Angels are wondering what you hope to achieve."

"Achieve? We're not achieving anything. We're just hanging. It's nice in here, consoles, comfy chairs, a forest. How's things with you?" The Doctor joked, but his tone didn't sound playful.

Everyone was silent when the angel replied. "The Angels are feasting, sir. Soon we will be able to absorb enough power to consume this vessel, this world, and all the stars and worlds beyond."

"Well, we have comfy chairs, did I mention?" The Doctor replied quickly.

"We have no need of comfy chairs." The Angel replied.

The Doctor looked back to Amy and I, "I made him say ' _comfy chairs_ ',"

Amy laughed, and I smiled. 

"Six."

The Doctor stood quickly, speaking back to the angel. "Okay, well, enough chat. Here's what I want to know: what have you done to Nova?"

"There is something in her eye."

I took a deep breath and looked around the room, trying to look for a reflective surface to see if there was anything. I found a small, triangular-shaped button that had a mirror on it on the console and leaned down to try to look in my eye.

"What's in her eye?" The Doctor asked from behind me.

As I finally got my eye in the small triangle shape, I jumped back as soon as I noticed a grey figure reflected all across my brown iris. I knew the angel wasn't lying when he responded, "We are."

I pushed myself off the console. "He's... he's not lying."

"What did you do, Nova?" River asked me calmly, but I could tell there was something else brewing underneath.

I shook my head. "I don't know," I lied, and the look River gave me told me she knew just as much. "Five."

Amy narrowed her eyes at me, gears turning in her head. "She's counting down. Why are you counting down?"

"I don't know," the Doctor shook his head, staring into my eyes again.

"Well, counting down to what?" Amy asked. I looked down, knowing what it was, trying to control my breathing. The Doctor brought his hand to my face, slowly lifting it to face him, making me look him in the eye again.

"I don't know," he spoke again, softly this time.

The radio screeched. "We shall take her. We shall take all of you. We shall have dominion over all time and space."

The Doctor turned away from me and sat in the chair again, pulling out the radio. "Get a life, Bob. Oops, sorry again. There's power on this ship, but nowhere near that much."

The radio crackled. "With respect, sir, there is more power on this ship than you yet understand."

As if right on cue, a loud noise that sounded like something between a woman screeching and nails raking across a chalkboard filled the room, and maybe even the entire ship. River turned her head back and forth, trying to figure out where it was coming from. "Dear God, what is it?"

The sound of stone crumbling ended the screams, but Father Octavian didn't dare put his weapon down. "They're back."

The radio sounded again. "It's hard to put in your terms, Dr. Song, but as best I understand it, the Angels are laughing."

The Doctor leaned forward, and slowly brought the radio close to his lips. "Laughing?"

"Because you haven't noticed yet. The Doctor in the TARDIS hasn't noticed," the angel over the radio taunted.

"Doctor!" Octavian shouted, noticing the Doctor rising up from his chair slowly, fearing he might do something rash.

The Doctor continued to rise, recalling, feeling something behind him, while I remembered something I almost forgot. "No, wait, there's something...I've..." The Doctor turned around to see the crack in the wall from Amy's room, the one that seemed to be following him everywhere. "Missed."

The Doctor ran around the console to get a closer look at the wall, looking surprised. 

Amy followed him. "That's... That's like the crack from my bedroom wall from when I was a little girl."

"Yes."

Soon enough the room started shaking, rumbling, and all of us struggled to keep hold. "OK, enough, we're moving out!" Octavian ordered.

I followed River as she approached Amy, the Doctor hurrying to the crack in the wall. "Agreed. Doctor?"

"Yeah, fine!" He called back, reaching up, using his sonic on the crack.

"What are you doing?"

"Right with you!"

"We're not leaving without you!"

"Oh, yes you are. Bishop?"

Father Octavian called to us from the forest. "Miss Pond, Miss Nova, Dr. Song, now!"

Before I could complain, River was already grabbing Amy and I and dragging us towards the forest and away from the crumbling room that was about to be attacked, with more force than I expected. Even though I wasn't that strong in the first place, I would normally put up a fight, but something felt off. Something in my head felt... cloudy, and before I knew it I was trudging along behind Amy and River through the forest, the Doctor still behind.

As the clouding in my head became more intense, a pain rushed through my brain along with it. I moved slower, feeling dizzy, trying to force my eyes to stay on Amy's red hair in front of me. When she turned, whatever focus and control I had left over my pain went away, and I felt it even worse. I tried not to show it, but she seemed to notice. "Nova? You okay?"

I wanted to respond, to tell her I was doing fine, but I was too focused on trying not to sway. River turned also. "Nova?" She gripped my arms, "Nova, what's wrong?"

"Four," I said numbly, and for the first time, I realized I said it. I put my hands up to my head, wanting to lie down, knowing I couldn't deny it anymore. It was happening. I swayed a little towards River and stumbled. I slowly crouched down curled up on a moss-covered rock, not comprehending whether I did it myself.

"Med-scanner, now!" River called, and moments later I felt her move something around my arm.

"Dr. Song, we can't stay here, we've got to keep moving," I heard Octavian reply.

"We wait for the Doctor," she replied stubbornly.

"Our mission is to make this wreckage safe and neutralize the Angels. Until that is achieved..."

"Father Octavian, when the Doctor is in the room, your only mission is to keep him alive long enough to get everyone else home, which includes keeping Nova alive, or else he'll never forgive any of us and I'll never forgive myself, and no one will work with you. And trust me. It's not easy. Now, if he's dead back there, I'll never forgive myself, and if he's alive, I'll never forgive him. And, Doctor, you're standing right behind me, aren't you?"

I felt something between relief and excitement at the sound of his voice. "Oh, yeah."

"I hate you!"

"You don't. Bishop, the Angels are in the forest," the Doctor called, as I felt him touch my arm on my other side, River behind me.

I heard Bishop call to his men. "We need visual contact on every line of approach."

"How did you get past them?" River asked the Doctor.

"Found a crack in the wall and told them it was the end of the universe."

My vision became less clouded, and I was able to see Amy crouch by the Doctor. "What was it?"

"The end of the universe," The Doctor picked up a med scanner. "Let's have a look then."

"What's happening?" I asked, almost afraid of saying anything else.

I felt River rub my arm. "Nothing. You're fine."

"Don't lie to me. I can regenerate anyway, right?" I asked.

I was able to move my eyes up slowly to see the Doctor furrowing his eyebrows at the scanner. "I'm sorry, Nova. This doesn't look like it. Eye. Something's in your eye. What does that mean? Doesn't mean anything," he rambled, standing up and pacing.

"Doctor," I said.

"Busy."

"Doctor, look at me."

The Doctor turned back to me slowly and crouched down, not saying anything, so I continued. I couldn't think straight, my mind hurt, and I knew why. I had to try to speed up his thinking process. Granted, it was probably faster than everyone else's thinking processes, but I already knew the answers. "Look in my eye."

"The image of an angel is an angel," Amy remembered, trying to help.

"Right, so a living image in a human mind. We stare at them to stop them getting closer, we don't even blink and that's exactly what they want, cos as long as our eyes are open, they can climb inside. There's an Angel in her mind," the Doctor cut himself off, coverimg his mouth with his hands almost in horror. Even though I couldn't find the strength to look up at him again, I knew the look he was giving me was a worried one.

I chose to do this myself. I had to remember that I was saving Amy, and that was a good thing, after letting the daleks go. I knew I had to close my eyes, but I didn't want to. "Oh god. Three."

"Doctor, she's going to die!" I heard Amy panic.

"Please just shut up, I'm thinking. Now counting, what's that about?" I heard some crackling and felt a lack of warmth in front of me, and thought I saw the blurry figure of the Doctor moving away from in front of me with his radio a few feet away. "Bob, why are they making her count?"

"To make her afraid, sir." I heard the angel reply from a distance. I thought about the fear I had. Before, when I was counting down, I was slightly afraid, but I felt assured in the fact that the Doctor and River and Amy were there, along with a team of soldiers. I wasn't afraid of the countdown.

Now that everything really did hurt, and I couldn't see straight, it felt real, but it still felt like a game. Like I was playing a dangerous game with the universe, seeing how much I could defy its original plans—how much I could change, how much I could save. Crouched down, eyes almost squinting shut, waves of pain washing over me—I feared that the universe was winning.

"Okay, but why? What for?"

"For fun, sir."

The Doctor growled in frustration and threw the radio, and the area went silent except for the beeping of the scanner still attached to me. I knew everyone was staring at him.

"Doctor," I called weakly, but I wasn't really sure why. I didn't need an explanation, I already knew what was going on. There was just something about him being near me that made me feel more comfortable, or more... safe.

The Doctor came over and knelt by me, and Amy moved closer to him. "Doctor, what's going on?"

"Inside her head, in the vision centers of her brain, there's an Angel. It's like there's a screen, a virtual screen inside her mind, and the Angel is climbing out of it, and it's coming..." The Doctor paused, "to shut her off."

"So then, we turn off the screen," I recommended, trying to make sense of it all, and trying to remember what Amy did before. It's a little bit harder in this state.

The Doctor stood again, "Right. If it was a real screen, what would we do, we'd pull the plug. But we can't just knock her out, the Angel would take over!"

"Then what? Quickly!" River rushed.

"We've got to shut down the vision centers of her brain. We've got to pull the plug, starve the Angel."

I heard beeping come from the scanner that River was messing with. "Doctor, she's got seconds!"

"How would you starve your lungs?" The Doctor asked.

"Stop breathing," I replied, finally knowing and remembering what was coming next.

"Nova, close your eyes!"

Something inside of me twisted in fear at the thought, and another wave of pain came over me. "No," I moaned. "I can't. I don't want to, I really, really don't..."

"Good, because that's not you, that's the Angel inside you, it's afraid! Do it! Close your eyes!" The Doctor kneeled beside me, and I found the strength to look up at him again. He was looking at me with sincerity and worry, and nodded at me. It was a small gesture, but it signaled that I would be okay. 

I took one last look at him and tried to commit it to memory, a small fear lingering in the back of my mind that I may never be able to ever again. I realized I wasn't afraid of the universe winning. I was afraid of the fact that with all these secrets around me, River being my friend, Bishop knowing me, my hair glowing... I had no idea what I was getting into.

Then, hesitantly, I did it. I closed my eyes.

 


	15. Flesh and Stone (pt 2)

I heard the rapid beeping from River's machine that was scanning my health slow down to a small ding. "She's normalizing," River sighed in relief, "You did it... you did it!"

I really did feel better, and was able to sit up and almost stand, until River put a hand on my shoulder. "Still weak, dangerous to move her."

I sighed, feeling surprisingly much better but also weary of not being able to see. "When can I open my eyes again?"

As I sat on the rock I felt River and Amy on either side of me, and realized the Doctor was crouching right in front of me when I heard his voice. "Nova, listen to me. If you open your eyes now for more than a second, you will die. The Angel is still inside you. We haven't stopped it, we've just sort of...paused it. You've used up your countdown. You _cannot_ open your eyes."

I felt both River and Amy's arms on my back and shoulder, trying to give me comfort, but I felt like I didn't deserve it. 

I heard Father Octavian call again. "Doctor, we're too exposed here. We have to move on."

The Doctor's voice sounded much farther than before. "We're exposed everywhere, and Nova can't move, and anyway, that's not the plan."

"What's the plan?" Amy asked.

"I don't know yet, I haven't finished talking. Right! Father, you and your Clerics will stay here, look after Nova. If anything happens to her, I'll hold each of you personally responsible, twice."

"No!" I protested. I remembered what would happen to all of the clerics if they stayed, and what I would have to do to get out, and probably horribly fail at. Everyone went silent, and I knew they were all waiting for an explanation. "Just let me go with you."

"With all due respect, Miss Nova, you'd slow us down." Father Octavian replied, his voice becoming farther away, River and Amy leaving my side.

"No, I can't stay, just don't worry about me, just let me follow," I argued.

I felt the Doctor sit next to me, and our shoulders and knees were touching. "You'll be safer here. We can't protect you on the move. I'll be back for you soon as I can. I promise,"

"Look, there's nothing stopping me from getting up and following you. Either I go with you, or..." I had to come up with another option, quick. I thought about the clerics and how they would be forgotten. "Or you let me stay here alone."

"Nova, people need to look at the angels to stop them, and someone should stay and protect you..."

"I don't need anyone to do that," I stated defensively, but I couldn't tell if I was lying. I was afraid of the angels, but for the most part, maybe I could protect myself. And if he wasn't going to let me go with him, I could at least get all the clerics out, and start walking away myself. Everyone lives. No one has to be erased from time.

"Oh god, _I'll_ stay with her!" Amy huffed, sounding not too far behind me when I thought she was already gone on the path. I felt her sit next to me, and I could have sworn she crossed her arms. 

This was definitely worse.

"Us too," One of the clerics said, and I felt the Doctor move away from me.

"Okay, then. Good luck everyone. Behave. Do not let her open her eyes. And keep watching the forest. Stop those angels advancing. Amy, Nova, later," he pat my head. "River, going to need your computer!" he called, and with that, he was gone.

I knew Amy would want to walk up to the crack if she saw it, and I couldn't let her. She was daring and curious, and I feared she wouldn't think twice about walking right up to it and erasing herself from time and space, and I would be responsible for her death. I had to stop it. 

"Amy... can you do something for me?" I asked her

"Sure,"

"Close your eyes with me," I rushed. It might help put things back on track. After all, she was supposed to have her eyes closed this entire time anyway.

She was silent for just a moment. "Yeah, okay," she responded, and I really hoped she wasn't lying. A few moments later she sighed, obviously bored, and I figured that she wasn't lying if she had to ask the clerics for information. "So, what's happening? Anything happening out there?"

"The angels are still grouping," one of the clerics said, "Are you getting this too?"

"Getting what?" I asked.

"The trees? Yeah," the other cleric responded.

"What's wrong with the trees?" Amy asked, sighing in frustration. "Nova, I'm sorry, I'm opening my eyes."

"No!" I yelled, awkwardly finding her face with my hands, probably slapping it. "Please just..." I realized that what I was saying probably made no sense to her, but I couldn't tell her about the crack near us, or she might go towards it now that the angel wasn't inside of her. Nothing was stopping her from doing it now. "Don't."

"Nova, you're just over-reacting, I've already opened my− eyes," she paused.

I sighed, not knowing what she was looking at. "Okay, just don't look in the angel's eyes," I reminded her. It would be horrible if I put myself through this to stop her looking at them, and she only went and did it anyway.

"They're taking out the lights, ripping the tree borgs apart," One of the clerics said. From listening to them talk back and forth for a while, I figured there were only two of them. It would be better if none of them decided to stay behind with me, but I had to admit, at least it was an improvement.

"What's going on, Amy?" I asked her urgently.

"It's the trees," she responded. "They're going out."

"Going out? You mean like—"

"The lights! The lights on the trees, they're going out, and the angels are getting closer."

I couldn't tell if I imagined it or not, but I could have sworn I felt Amy inch closer to me.

As if confirming Amy's previous statement, the clerics kept chattering. "Angels advancing, Sir."

"Weapons primed. Combat distance five feet. Wait for it!" I heard the other cleric command.

I felt Amy stand up, and idiotically swung my hand around until I grabbed her arm, and yanked it down. 

Amy sat back down, and thankfully stayed. "Oi!"

"You have to stay down!" I reminded her anxiously.

She grunted out of annoyance, still not getting up, but instead yelling, "What is it?"

"Keep your position, ma'am!" I heard the cleric shout to her.

"The ship's not on fire, is it?" The other cleric asked.

"It can't be. The compressors would have taken care of it. Marco, the Angels have gone. Where'd they go?"

I shook my head, even though I figured no one was looking at me. "What do you mean, the Angels are gone?"

"There's still movement out there, but away from us now. It's like they're running," Marco, the cleric observed.

"Running from what?" Amy asked, sounding exasperated with their soldier-like antics.

"Philip-- need to get a closer look at that," Marco said, the two of them running toward the light.

"No!" I yelled, standing up. "Get back! At least one of you! Come over here!" Thankfully Marco seemed to stand back, but Philip kept running towards the light, towards the silence that would get him erased from time, and there didn't seem to be anything I could do about it.

I felt Amy get up next to me. "Actually, Nova, I think I want to go see that too..."

Still not opening my eyes, I stumbled, and found myself hugging her awkwardly around the waist, pinning her arms down to her side. "No! You can't!" I pleaded.

She grunted, struggling to get out of my grasp. "Ugh, why not! Just calm down, Nova!" She started grabbing at my arms, trying to pry them away from her waist, but I was hanging on to her for dear life. "I need to go see it! It's the same shape. It's the crack in my wall. It's following me! How can it be following me?"

"Just wait until Philip gets back!" I reasoned. Maybe once he disappeared, Amy would understand what I mean, but in the mean time, I had to act like I had no clue what was happening and make a case for her not to go at the same time. "It might be dangerous and... you might die!" I frantically shouted.

She grunted again, and stopped struggling. "Fine!" She gave up. 

A few moments later, with my arms still hugging her rather awkwardly, she spoke up again. "You can let go of me now."

I shook my head. "Not a chance." I was afraid that if I let go, she might take the opportunity to run away and be erased from all of time.

She sighed. "God, what's gotten into you? What happened to, it's a whole new world! Let's go explore!" she mimicked, reminding me of the time I was so eager to discover the Starship UK.

"There are angels of death in my eyeball. _That's_ whats gotten into me!"

Amy sighed.

The crack in the wall, the silence... I wonder if it had anything to do with my being here. River mentioned before that the threat in my head was there in the first place not just because of Prisoner Zero. She also seemed to have purposefully let it slip that the Silence had a part in it too. 

If I just looked at it for a second, maybe I could see something, or I could get a useful flashback. Maybe I could be one hundred percent certain that the Silence somehow brought me here, or erased my old Time Lady memories.

"Are you okay, ma'am?" Marco asked. He was the only one here now, since there were only two of them here in the first place.

I couldn't tell if he was talking to me or Amy, but either way, I responded. "I think I'm going to look at it," I decided.

"Nova, you can't," Amy warned me. Now the tables were really turned.

"Ma'am. You can't," Marco confirmed.

I thought about it. I knew that I really couldn't, but if I remembered correctly, it's the same thing Amy would have done if she were in my position, and she survived. I just needed all the help I could get in figuring out why I'm here and who was doing all of this to me. "Look, I'm just going to open my eyes for just a second. Just a few seconds, I swear. I still had a little countdown left from before, remember?" I reminded them, but I wasn't sure if I was doing it more to assure them or assure myself. 

Either way, I was sure I was going to do it now. I had to look. I just _had_ to check.

"Nova—" Amy started, but before she could say anything else, I opened my eyes, and gasped.

Unfortunately, I didn't gasp because I got a flashback or anything. I gasped because the pain from before hit me again, and it was so blinding I was having trouble looking at the crack. When I did, though, I felt almost betrayed by myself when I got nothing. It was just a shining, fluctuating crack in the wall.

Maybe it was stupid, but everything I was feeling was starting to catch up to me, and the seriousness of the situation dawned on me yet again, and I wanted to cry. I didn't know why I was here, I didn't know why I couldn't say anything, and I didn't know if I would say anything even if I were allowed to. Was I selfish for not saying anything about the future anyway? It would hurt me, and maybe I would die, but wouldn't a ton of other, much more important people die if I didn't? Or would saying something completely destroy the timelines and then even more people would die than before?

I have no idea what I hated more—the Silence, the universe, or just myself for being so stupid, for not being smart enough to figure it out and put a stop to it, or fix things. I was trying my hardest. I was refusing to let Amy get hurt because she was my friend now, and trying to fix all these things... but was I really fixing anything after all? Maybe some things are just not meant to be fixed, no matter how hard you tried. 

On top of all these crippling life questions and doubts, I still had a killer headache, but I couldn't take my eyes off of the crack and the light shining through it, even as I slowly fell to the ground, feeling too weak to hold myself up.

As I fell, I felt Amy and Marco supporting me, grabbing me by the arms as I crouched gently until I was sitting again. 

I felt a hand cover my eyes, forcing them shut, and realized they were too rough and meaty to be Amy's. "Are you okay?" Marco asked me.

I couldn't force myself to say anything, because I wouldn't be able to explain myself to either of them, so I only nodded, worrying that my life was starting be ruled by the things I didn't say.

"Okay, listen, listen. I need to get a closer look at that light, whatever it is. Don't worry, I won't get too close," Marco told me.

"No!" I shouted immediately. Now Marco wanted to go, too. This is exactly what I've been trying to avoid this entire time.

"Hang on, what about Philip? Why not just wait 'til he gets back?" Amy asked Marco.

"Who?" Marco asked.

"The ones you sent before," Amy tried, figuring he just didn't understand what she meant. It was way worse than that.

"I didn't send anyone before," Marco told her. Even though it wasn't true, he believed it whole-heartedly, because now he couldn't remember. 

I didn't even try to say anything, and just let Amy be confused, and hopefully discourage herself from going near it. "You did. I heard you. His name is Philip," she tried reminding him.

"Who?" Marco asked again.

I could tell Amy was starting to become worried now. "Something's happening! Philip was here a second ago and now you can't even remember him," I felt her touch my arm. "Nova, tell him. There was Philip, right?"

I swallowed hard. "Yeah, there was..." I trailed sadly. I snapped myself out of it, knowing Marco would still want to go investigate the light. I didn't want to wait until he got more ideas to convince him otherwise, I knew he already had to be thinking about it, anyway. "Marco, you can't go. You can't. I know you don't believe us, but there was another man here and you forgot him. He's gone. If you go, you'll be gone too," I explained.

"There was never a Philip," Marco resisted. "There's only ever been the three of us here!"

"No, there were four of us. Why can't you remember?" Amy asked in frustration.

I felt Marco touch my shoulder, and put a device in my hands. "Here, spare communicator. I'll stay in touch the whole time," he assured me, but I knew that he wouldn't. I knew that he would only be erased from time too, and I wasn't going to let him.

I reached up quickly and grabbed his arm, even digging my nails into it for good measure. I didn't mean to hurt him, but he had to know how desperate I was for him not to go. I had the chance to stop him, so I was going to say and do as much as I could think of. "You have to stay here," I rushed. "If you don't, then..."

"If you go back there what happened to the Philip will happen to you!" Amy helped, catching on to the danger in the light of the crack.

"There wasn't a Philip!" Marco snapped.

"There won't be any YOU if you go back there!" Amy argued back.

Marco put a hand on my shoulder. "Two minutes, I promise," he assured us quietly.

I felt him get up from my side, and Amy get up from my other side. "Please, just listen to me!" she begged him.

"Marco, stay back, please! Please don't go!" I begged him. I was running out of words to say, and I knew that none of them had worked when I didn't hear a response, only distant footsteps. I got up and turned to Amy abruptly, really not knowing if she would go after him, and thinking she probably would. 

I really needed to get her out of here. I couldn't do anything about those two clerics, and I had to be one hundred percent sure that nothing would happen to her. Things were slowly starting to be less and less like how I originally saw them in the episode, and I wasn't taking any more chances. "Amy, go."

"What? No!" she cried.

"I mean to the Doctor! Go find him! You need to leave!" I pleaded. If she could just follow the path and get back to where the Doctor and River were, she would officially be safe. "Please just go, I'll be fine."

Amy put her hands on my shoulders, turning me slightly, so now I was really facing her. "I know what you meant. So what, you want me to just leave you here? All alone?"

"Yes!" I argued back. Amy was only suggesting it sarcastically, but that's exactly what I was going for. "Trust me. Run. I have this communicator," I assured her, raising up the hand that was holding the small rectangular device.

I felt Amy shift around awkwardly, taking her hands off my shoulders and stepping back just a little. I knew she was weighing out her options now. I considered her a good friend in my mind, but really, she didn't know me that well. I wondered how much she would be willing to leave me, or willing to stay. I feared that her will to go see the crack in the wall might be stronger, and knew that I really had to do something big to get her out of here, because I wasn't letting anyone else get erased from time. 

I didn't get this Angel trapped in my soul for nothing. So before she could say anything else, I did something incredibly stupid. 

I opened my eyes.

"Nova, what—close your eyes!" She reached out a hand to put it over my eyes as Marco did before, but with all my remaining strength, I stumbled backwards, out of her reach.

With the unrelenting pain in my head, I was regretting opening my eyes already, but I knew it might be the only way to make Amy go find him, and not go into the light anymore. "Not until I see you go," my voice croaked. My vision was becoming clouded, and I knew that couldn't be a good thing. I didn't know how much I had left in my countdown, or if there was any left.

Amy stared at me in fear and shock that could be easily mistaken for a look of betrayal. I had to keep reminding myself that I wasn't betraying her. I was keeping her safe. I couldn't help Philip or Marco, and now Amy was only staring at me wide-eyed, my vision clouding. I thought for a second that maybe I should just let it, until Amy shook her head. She gasped as if about to say something, but made a small whimpering noise I could barely hear. She ran fast, away to the Doctor and River, to safety.

I widened my eyes even more for good measure, watching her run away, then shut them tight again.

**888**

Further into the forest just outside the primary flight deck, the Doctor was pointing his sonic screwdriver at Father Octavian, who was stuck in a chokehold from an angel. The Doctor was staring at it with wide eyes, refusing to look away in fear of it snapping the Bishop's neck, but Father Octavian already knew it was a lost cause. "Sir, there's nothing you can do."

"You're dead if I leave you," The Doctor said.

Octavian was sweating now, and managed a small nod with the angel's stone arm firmly around his neck, threatening to snap it the second the Doctor blinked. "Yes, yes I'm dead, and before you go..."

"I'm not going," the Doctor trembled, putting his sonic down.

Father Octavian knew there was nothing anyone could do, so he decided his best move was to tell him. He knew that technically, he couldn't for many reasons, but he had to try. "Listen to me, it's important! You can't trust her."

"Trust who?"

"River Song," Octavian breathed. "You think you know her, but you don't. You don't understand who or what she is. And the same goes for that Nova girl. You truly don't know her right now. She doesn't know herself either."

"Then tell me."

"I've told you more than I should. Now, please, you have to go. It's your duty to your friends."

The Doctor knew he was dying, but maybe if he stalled he could get him out, and get answers. "Just tell me why River was in Stormcage."

Octavian figured he was going to die now for certain anyway, and spilled a little more. "She stole something. And she killed a man, a good man, a hero to many."

"Who?" The Doctor asked.

"You don't want to know, sir. You really don't."

The Doctor had tears in his eyes now, still refusing to blink. He was both determined for him to make it out alive, and to get some answers. At least he knew now that she didn't kill Amy or Nova, but... "Who did she kill?"

"Sir, the Angels are coming. You have to leave me," Father Octavian quaked, not caring about answers anymore. He was going to die now.

"You'll die," The Doctor stated, but figuring it was over.

"I will die in the knowledge that my courage did not desert me at the end. For that, I thank God and bless the path that takes you to safety," Octavian assured him.

The Doctor nodded. "I wish I'd known you better," he told him sincerely.

"I think, sir, you know me at my best."

The Doctor could barely keep his eyes open, and knew it was time. "Ready?"

Father Octavian closed his eyes. "Content."

The Doctor sniffled, taking one last long look before running to the hatch and closing it behind him.

**888**

When The Doctor entered the room, he found that River was working around with some devices. "There's a teleport! If I can get it to work, we can beam the others here. Where's Octavian?"

The Doctor hesitated. "Octavian's dead, so is that teleport. You're wasting your time. I'm going to need your communicator," he told her harshly. How bad could she be if Father Octavian's last thoughts were to tell him so?

River knew what must have happened to Octavian, and wondered if he knew anything now. It was twisted, because before, he already knew. The Doctor didn't notice the look on her face.

**888**

After only a few minutes of walking along an obvious trail that they had left behind, Amy found a hatch and opened it slowly.

When she stepped through the hatch, River and the Doctor's eyes were immediately on her. "Amy!" The Doctor looked happy to see her at first, until he noticed something very important was missing.

"Where's Nova?" River asked, saying what the Doctor was thinking.

Amy shook her head. "I'm sorry, she's still back there. She made me come. She was—she was just... crazy!" Amy breathed, not knowing how else to put it.

River stepped closer to her, a dark look on her face. "Amy, what did she do?"

Amy's eyes darted to the Doctor, almost for help, even though he wasn't there. He gave her a look that was still worried, but less intimidating than River's. "Where is she?"

Amy couldn't look at him anymore, and turned back to River. "She's alive, she... opened her eyes, and said if I didn't come she wouldn't close them."

River shook her head and went back over to the piece she was working on, jabbing hard at the buttons now, angry. "Of course she would. Of course. There was something there, wasn't there? Something threatening you, something dangerous..." River trailed.

"Yeah, something was there. It was killing the clerics, but it was making them forget they existed," Amy was trying to find the right words to explain it.

The Doctor's eyes seemed like they were going to pop out of his head. "And you _left_ her there?!" He asked her, angry now.

Amy knew this would happen. "I had to! The crack in my wall, it was there. Doctor, how could it be there?"

The Doctor didn't respond. Amy wasn't the one he was warned about, after all. He turned to River. "You knew?" he fumed. She seemed to understand what had happened.

River whipped around from her workspace with a hard look, trying to hide how offended she was. "You don't know her yet, Doctor. I'm her best friend. I know firsthand what lengths she would go to for the people she cares about. She'll do anything, even if it kills her," River gulped, tears coming to her eyes, remembering something she desperately wished she could forget, but she wouldn't dare. For Nova.

The Doctor didn't want to think about what that meant, and went back to work on the communicator.

**888**

I was sitting on the rock again, alone this time, and decided to figure out how to use the communicator. I felt all around it and conveniently only found one button on the side, and pressed it down. "Marco?"

The radio crackled. "I'm here. I'm fine. I'm quite close to it now."

I wanted to sigh of relief, but I didn't know what I could possibly say to make him come back. "I was kind of hoping you'd say polo..." I trailed, and for just a second heard a small snort on the other line. "Amy's gone now. I'm alone. She left. Just come back, please!"

He didn't seem to hear anything else I was saying. "It's weird looking at it. It feels really..." his voice was cut off by static, and then nothing.

"Marco, please, please come back," I begged, even though I knew I was begging to nothing now, and he was gone. "Come back, please..."

There was silence, until I heard a different voice over the radio.

"Nova? Nova, is that you?" The Doctor asked over the radio.

"Doctor?" I breathed, relieved that he was there, even if it was only on a radio.

"Where are you? What happened to the Clerics?"

I sighed. "They're gone," I whispered, trying to hide the tears that were threatening to fall out of my voice. "They went into a light and they didn't remember each other," I explained, barely putting effort into sounding clueless, like I didn't understand what just happened. Now they never existed anymore and I knew it.

"No, they wouldn't," The Doctor confirmed.

"What is that light?" I heard River ask in the background.

"Time running out," The Doctor responded, sounding far away, until he put his mouth close to the radio again, and I could hear him clearly. "Nova, I'm sorry, I made a mistake. I should never have left you there."

"I know. It's okay," I assured him. "Just get me out."

"Nova..." the Doctor trailed, sounding regretful. "I am _very_ sorry."

"I know you are." I told him again. He didn't listen to me before, but he was sorry, and he didn't know what was going to happen anyway. It wasn't really his fault. "Now what do I do?"

"You come to us. Primary Flight Deck, other end of the forest," he was talking rapidly now, and I knew he was getting to work.

I stood up with all intention of walking, but felt really uncomfortable about it. "You do know I can't see, right?"

I heard the sound of a sonic screwdriver over the radio. "Turn on the spot."

"Okay...?" I wondered, but still began to turn where I was standing.

"When the communicator sounds like my screwdriver, you're facing the right way. Follow the sound," I kept turning slowly, remembering what part this was. That I would have to maneuver through a pack of Angels blind. Maybe I regretted sending Amy back just a tiny bit. I turned until I heard the screwdriver sound at the right pitch. "You have to start moving now. There's time energy spilling out of that crack and you have to stay ahead of it."

"There's Angels... there's Angels everywhere,"

"I'm sorry, I really am, but the Angels can only kill you."

**888**

Amy was hearing everything the Doctor and Nova were saying with curiosity and fear. "What does the Time Energy do?"

"If the Time Energy catches up with you, you'll never have been born. It will erase every moment of your existence. You will never have lived at all." The Doctor explained to Amy.

"Wonderful," Nova mumbled sarcastically over the radio.

The Doctor had forgotten that she could hear everything after he soniced the communicator so the button was always being held down, and spoke into it again. "Just—keep your eyes shut and keep moving."

"It's never going to work," River shook her head.

"WHAT ELSE HAVE YOU GOT?!" The Doctor shouted, causing both Amy and River to flinch back. Amy had never seen him that angry before. "River, tell me!"

River looked away, and kept trying to fix the transporter. She had something.

 


	16. Flesh and Stone (pt 3)

I kept moving forward through the forest with my eyes closed, paying too close attention to the sonic noise coming from the radio. I was trying to concentrate on moving as fast as I could, but I was afraid I would trip over something.

"Nova, listen to me," I heard the Doctor call me over the radio. "I'm sending a bit of software to your communicator. It's a proximity detector. It'll beep if there's something in your way. You just maneuver till the beeping stops. Because, Nova, this is important. The forest is full of angels," he warned me, as if I needed reminding. It was almost all I was thinking about. I was walking blind straight into an army of Weeping Angels. "You're going to have to walk like you can see."

**888**

"That time energy, what's it going to do?" River asked the Doctor, not looking up from the teleport she was trying to fix. She wasn't going to let Nova down.

"Er, keep eating," the Doctor rubbed his face nervously.

"How do we stop it?"

"Feed it."

Amy stood up from where she was sitting and walked over to the Doctor. "Feed it what?"

"A big complicated space-time event should shut it up for a while."

"Like what, for instance."

"Like me, for instance!" The Doctor shouted again, Amy still flinching, but River giving him a knowing look. The Doctor was extremely worried about Nova; he had to admit it. He didn't want to lose her for many, many reasons, and he didn't know what River was doing and Amy didn't seem to be helping, seeing as to how she just wandered off leaving Nova alone in the first place. The Doctor didn't know how to feel about it, though. Nova had threatened her, but she was trying to keep Amy safe, and it worked. Now the Doctor was determined to do the same for Nova.

**888**

I heard a high-pitched beeping echo through the radio, but also throughout the forest. "What is that?" I asked the Doctor through the radio.

"It's a warning. There are Angels around you now." The Doctor explained to me.

I could feel the lights flash through my closed eyelids as the beeping continued. "Oh," I commented. "...joy," I cheered in monotone, sarcastically. I was surrounded by them, and even if I didn't have the beeping, there was something eerie in the atmosphere. I could feel them here.

"Nova. listen to me. This is going to be hard but I know... you can do it," the Doctor assured me. I was walking extremely slowly now, listening for the beep and trying not to sway and keep my footing. "The Angels are scared and running and right now they're not that interested in you. They'll assume you can see them and their instincts will kick in. All you've got to do is walk like you can see," the Doctor gulped. His words made me stop in my tracks. I was terrified, to say the least. It's not like I was terrified into not moving either, I was just afraid that I would mess up and die if I did. 

"Just don't open your eyes. Walk like you can see... You're not moving, you have to do this." The beeping was still the same, and I was a little confused on how it worked, and really scared to move. 

"Now." The doctor told me again. I didn't say anything, only stood in place, trying to give myself the courage to move. I heard a bang over the radio. " _You have to do this!_ " The Doctor shouted.

I nodded, even though no one could see me. I assumed that the pace of the communicator was slow right now, at normal, and took a small step forward. The communicator was already beeping a little faster. I turned to the side just a little bit, and the communicator starting beeping extremely fast, and I gasped, feeling something in front of me, and leaned back just a little, moving myself at a different angle to take a few more steps forward. Little by little, I was able to take a few more steps, and the beeping was slow again. 

My breathing was ragged, small gasps and a few whimpers escaping my mouth, and my footing was extremely careful. Although wearily, I got more confident with each step, thinking there wasn't anything in front of me for a while with the beeping at the same pace. 

That was my first mistake. I walked just a little faster, and randomly, the beeping went wild. I gasped again and jumped backwards, and dropped the radio.

"Doctor," I spoke slowly. "I dropped the thing. I dropped the radio," I told him, but I heard no response. "Doctor? River? Amy, anyone?" I called, but I couldn't hear anything except the slow beeping of the communicator I dropped somewhere on the ground. I crouched down quickly and felt around me to get it, but after a few seconds I stood back up, and hoped that the angels didn't see how I couldn't figure out where it was. 

"Uh... too much dirt," I said, hoping that if the Angels understood English (because I still hadn't exactly figured out if they could even hear me), maybe they would just think that I was a germophobe who didn't like to touch things with dirt on them. I couldn't walk forward anymore, because I had no idea where I was going and would probably run into an angel with my luck, and I couldn't move backwards either with the Time Energy bleeding out, or I would get erased too. So I didn't do anything. I just stayed still, and hoped that maybe the Angels just... wouldn't notice. I hugged myself, remembering the maroon shirt I was wearing. Maybe if I were wearing more grey I would blend in. 

And it was upon that hopeless thought that I heard it.

The sound of stone rumbling.

When I heard the stone rumble from far behind me, I hoped that maybe I was just really paranoid and hearing things. But the sound grew louder, and even more stone could be heard, and I knew what it was. The Angels were starting to notice that I had my eyes closed and couldn't see them, and were turning to look at me. Or even worse, they were probably reaching out to kill me. "Don't you dare!" I told them aloud, as if it would change anything. I was about to put my hands up in protection, but realized that would probably just increase the chances of them touching me. "Doctor!" I yelled, running out of ideas now. They were reaching for me.

"Anyone, someone? Please, someone..." I called, cut off by the feeling of coldness and arms wrapping around me.

"Don't open your eyes. You're on the Flight Deck, the Doctor's here. I teleported you," I sighed of relief when I realized the voice was River. "See? Told you I could get it working."

"River Song, I could bloody kiss you," I heard the Doctor say from behind me, and suddenly felt really uncomfortable for reasons I couldn't quite put my finger on.

River laughed, and I walked backwards away from her, feeling put out by the subtle flirting going on, only to run into someone. I stumbled back even more, and felt two hands steady me from my waist and immediately recognized who they belonged to. "Oops, um, sorry," I blushed, stepping forward a little, but the hands were still around my waist. "Um, Amy?" I asked.

"Yeah," she called me from farther away. The Doctor was steadying me, and wasn't saying anything. "Come here," she said, this time sounding closer, grabbing my arm unexpectedly and yanking me to her.

"Sorry about that," I told her, hoping she understood I was referring to the whole incident of opening my eyes as a threat.

Amy let go of me. "Yeah, I know," she told me, but she didn't sound like she knew.

An alarm blared loudly before I could apologize any further. "What's that?" River asked.

"The Angels are draining the last of the ship's power, which means..." I heard the Doctor move, "The shield's going to release!"

River was holding on to me again, both of her hands grabbing my arms while a mechanical whirring could be heard. "What's happening?" I whispered.

"The wall opened and there's angels there," Amy explained, though it barely made sense to me.

"Angel Bob, I presume." The Doctor said.

"The Time Field is coming. It will destroy our reality," The Angel reported. It was strange hearing its voice not on a radio. Even though it was a normal Cleric's voice, something about the way it echoed around the room was scary.

"Yeah, and look at you, all running away. What can I do for you?" The Doctor asked.

"There is a rupture in time. The Angels calculate that if you throw yourself into it, it will close and they will be saved."

I shook my head. "No," I muttered quietly, but I wasn't sure if anyone but River could hear me.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Could do, could do that. But why?"

"Your friends would also be saved."

"Well, there is that."

I felt River move away from me, and I knew she went up to the Doctor. "I've travelled in time. I'm a complicated space-time event, too. Throw me in."

"River!" I shouted at her, but I didn't get an answer.

"Oh, be serious! Compared to me, these Angels are more complicated than you and it would take every one of them to amount to me, so get a grip," The Doctor instructed her.

"Doctor, I can't let you do this," she argued.

"No, seriously, get a grip."

"You're not going to die here!" River insisted again, meanwhile I was trying to slowly walk forward towards them, feeling around me and willing myself not to bump into anything or trip.

"No, I mean it. River, Amy, Nova, get a grip."

"Oh, you genius!" River breathed, coming back to me and grabbing my hands, leading me around. So much for trying to walk to her.

"What does he mean?" I asked, hoping that the main reason for my not understanding the situation is because my eyes were closed. I hated feeling like I couldn't keep up with any of them. It made me feel not only useless as a scientist, but useless as a Time Lady, even if I wasn't too sure what that meant yet. I didn't know what they were planning, and I couldn't remember. 

The Doctor talked on with the Angels.

"Thing is, Bob, the Angels are draining all the power from this ship, every last bit of it. And you know what? I think they've forgotten where they're standing. I think they've forgotten the gravity of the situation. Or to put it another way, Angels..." as he finished that sentence, I understood what he meant. Earlier when we were walking through the forest, up the many levels of the soul, he was explaining to me how gravity worked in these types of spaceships. I couldn't help myself. I wanted to know how everything worked, and the Doctor seemed to have all the answers.

River moved my hands to touch a cold steel rod, which I assumed was like a railing attached to some of the ship controls. "You hold on tight and don't let go for anything," River instructed me. 

Guessing what was about to happen, I gripped on to the rail as tight as I could, moving my arms around it so I was almost hugging the metal, since I didn't trust my own strength. She moved away from me and I heard her talk to Amy. "You too. Hold on, and don't let go."

"Night-night," The Doctor finished. Almost as soon as he said that, the gravity failed just as I expected  due to the loss of power. The deck turned sideways, and my feet were no longer touching the ground, my whole body threatening to be sucked into the light of the silence behind me, like a vacuum breathing in dust if I let go. I was sure that I was hanging on so tight my knuckles were turning white, but I didn't scream. I held on for dear life and concentrated on doing just that—hanging in there.

**888**

We were back on the beach at dawn, Amy leaning on a rock with me next to her. We were both sharing a blanket, and the Doctor was standing in front of us. I was so happy to see him, her, and the lands of a foreign plant—but mostly, I was just so happy to _see_.

"Ugh, bruised everywhere!" Amy moaned, closing her eyes and leaning her head back.

"Me too," the Doctor joined in.

"Well at least neither of you had to crawl out blind," I reminded them, but I also reminded myself. Maybe Philip was still gone, but at least Marco and a few other Clerics had survived. Right?

The Doctor shook his head. "Neither did you, I kept saying. The Angels all fell into the time field. The Angel in your memory never existed. It can't harm you now."

"Then why do we remember it at all? Those guys on the ship didn't remember each other," Amy inquired.

"You're time travellers now, Amy. Changes the way you see the universe forever. Good, isn't it?" he smiled, and I gave a small smile back.

Amy smiled a little too, but then her face grew serious. "And the crack. Is that gone too?"

The Doctor paused for a moment. "Yeah, for now. But the explosion that caused it is still happening... somewhere out there, somewhere in time."

For the first time, when The Silence or the crack was mentioned, I didn't even think about it. I didn't tense up or remind myself of everything, I didn't even think about the episode. I wasn't looking at the Doctor or Amy anymore, and maybe this sounded horrible, but I was busy thinking about myself. 

I still didn't know how or why I got here, and even though nothing happened when I looked at the crack, I just felt like it _had_ to have something to do with this. I heard Octavian and River talking about how I didn't know who I was yet. What is that even supposed to mean? Sure, everyone grows as a person, but they were making it sound like I turned into someone entirely different. Or maybe I did something big in the future, and they saw me differently. Or maybe I regenerated.

Either way, the bottom line is: I've gone through all these theories in my head countless times and I still had zero answers. Obviously, if I wanted any real answers, I was going to have to go and actually get them myself. My gaze shifted from the coastline of the beach, of a different planet—a different sunset, to River Song, who was standing off in the distance doing something on her device.

I stood up; shrugging off the blanket I was sharing with Amy and walked up to River, not caring if I was cold or in shock. I needed to know something. I took no care in the fact that I had just spontaneously left in the middle of the previous conversation either. I just stalked up next to River Song and crossed my arms, more as an act of protecting myself than intimidation. "River, you need to tell me something. Anything. Just tell me about my future. Why am I here? Please. What am I supposed to do?"

"You, me...handcuffs," River held up her hands, showing the futuristic-looking handcuffs she was trapped in, "must it always end this way?"

I huffed. "River—"

"What now?" the Doctor asked, appearing just beside me, walking to stand just in front of River. I willed myself not to flinch. He must have followed me here, and I didn't notice, being too transfixed on getting an answer.

River looked at me, as if asking if I _really_ wanted to know, but stared at the beach again, answering the Doctor instead. "The prison ship's in orbit. They'll beam me up any second. I might have done enough to earn a pardon this time. We'll see."

The Doctor turned to her and gave her a look that seemed serious, but also tired. "Octavian said you killed a man," he suggested, and I figured he came for some answers, too.

River turned to me and raised her eyebrows, and I knew whatever she was going to say next was the all the answer I was going to get. "Yes. I did. A good man. A very good man. The best man I've ever known," She told the Doctor, smirking, and I shook my head slightly, looking back at the beach. I knew that already, that had to be the same exact answer she gave in the show. It wasn't making any difference, telling me who I would become or how I'm even here or anything.

"I also stole something," she added, her smirk gone from her face. I turned to her sharply. That was different... but what could she have stolen that had to do with me? Or what did I change that she had to steal something?

"Who? What did you steal?" The Doctor asked her.

River shook her head. "It's a long story, Doctor-- can't be told. It has to be lived. No sneak previews," she glanced to me. "Well, except for this one: you'll see me again quite soon, when the Pandorica opens," River glanced to me again, "And you need to remember that," she hinted. 

I remembered that she told me about herself and about Prisoner Zero because I told her when our first meeting would be, so I assumed it was at the Pandorica.

"The Pandorica, ha!" The Doctor smirked, leaning in to whisper in her ear, "That's a fairy tale."

Even if it was just something as simple as leaning in to whisper in her ear, I felt uncomfortable with the situation again, and felt like I should turn away. Or just run into the alien ocean in front of me, or hide in the alien sand. The discomfort I was feeling didn't make any sense to me, but for once I didn't need it to. All I knew was that I wanted it to stop.

River Song laughed. "Oh, Doctor, aren't we all? I'll see you there."

The Doctor was biting his lip now, and I didn't want them to really start flirting, so I smiled, snapping back to reality. "Can't wait," I chirped in, maybe a little too quickly, but I meant it anyway. Maybe by then I would know something.

"I remember it well," River smiled, but it was not a smile of happy nostalgia, looking back on old memories. It was a smile of wishing she could re-live them and do it again. I wondered what it meant.

Amy walked up to her, our blanket still wrapped tight around her shoulders now. "Bye, River."

"See you, Amy." Her futuristic handcuffs beeped, and lit up a little. "Oh! I think that's my ride."

"Teleport?" I asked, hoping I was right, wondering what she could have meant.

She smirked. "Yes."

I narrowed my eyes, "How does that work if—"

River chuckled. "You'll understand when you're older."

I pouted. The Doctor was looking at her quizzically. "Can I trust you. River Song?"

"If you like, but where's the fun in that?" She laughed.

"Can I?" I added quickly. It had to be different between us than it was with the Doctor.

River's face fell. "I wish." She sighed, and with that, her handcuffs teleported her away. I wanted to reach out, to stop the dust from carrying her away, but I knew it wouldn't work. What did that mean, _I wish_? 

So I couldn't trust her?

The Doctor turned to look out at the beach. Slowly, Amy and I were beside him, too. "What are you thinking?" She asked quietly.

He didn't take his eyes off the beach. "Time can be rewritten."

I thought about how I took the place of Amy, and not much seemed to have gone wrong. I was pretty sure I even saved some Clerics, too. I thought of how River asked Amy if she thought I was simple when asked about marriage, and what it meant about the strange feeling I kept getting in my chest. 

Maybe time really could be rewritten... but did I want it to be?

**888**

"Why did you do that?" Amy asked me suddenly, standing next to me as we stood staring off the coast of a foreign planet, nearly the same spot as before, while the Doctor checked the TARDIS before we went in. I couldn't tell if she was mad or not, but I assumed she was.

I didn't really expect to talk about this so soon, and I wasn't sure if we were on the same page anyway. "Do what?"

She glared at me. "You know what. You could have died in the forest, but you made me leave. Why?"

She didn't know I took her place getting the angel in my eye. The main reason I made the decision in the trailer was just _guilt_ —Guilt for everything I've done, and everything I haven't done. But I knew in my heart that couldn't be all. I had forgotten about a few other clerics, when I could have easily died for them, too. Maybe it was harsh, but I didn't know them. I didn't know Amy too well yet either, but I had already decided who she was to me in my head.

"Because... you're my friend," I admitted sheepishly. "You could have died too."

I expected her to be mad. Or touched, maybe, or even just annoyed. I did not expect her whole face to go pale, her eyes go wide, and lips part slightly in shock and fear—but that's exactly what she did anyway.

Paranoid, I turned back to see if maybe she was scared of something behind me, but there was nothing there. "Why are you looking at me like that?"

"She said... that's what she said," Amy mumbled.

"That's what who said?"

"River!" Amy exclaimed. "She said you would do anything for your friends."

"Okay..." I trailed. "I don't understand why that's a bad thing."

"She said you would die," Amy breathed.

Now it was my turn to go pale, eyes wide. What if River was avoiding telling me anything because there was barely anything to tell, since I would die so soon? What if that's what she meant by _I wish_? I was a Time Lady. I could just regenerate, right?

"I'm not going to die, Amy." I tried to assure her, but I couldn't push the fear away myself.

Before she could respond, the Doctor poked his head out the TARDIS door. "Come on!"

**888**

As soon as we entered the TARDIS, Amy walked off to her room so it was just the Doctor and I, lingering around the console.

"Nova, " he started, looking up at me.

I was fiddling with something on the console, trying to figure out what it did, and jumped back when he snuck up on me. I jerked my hands away fast and tried to make it seem like I wasn't doing anything, but he was smiling. I didn't even bother saying anything at this point, and just looked at him expectantly.

"I need to tell you... Well, ask you something, first."

He looked down, almost as if he was about to change his mind, but then stared right back at me with careful eyes. "You remembered the daleks," he started slowly. "Do you remember anything about... me?"

I tried to search for the answer he wanted to hear in his eyes, but I couldn't tell what he was thinking. I knew what he did to his... to _our_ home planet, Gallifrey, but I didn't know if I was allowed to say it with Prisoner Zero in my brain. I was scared of losing my breath, and I was scared of his reaction, so I only nodded.

"Then you know, I'll do whatever it takes to keep you safe," he assured me.

I didn't know how to feel about that. It was nice that he would protect me, but I hated the feeling that I needed it. I didn't want to have to be protected, but I couldn't say I didn't like the feeling. Not only that, but with what River was saying, the Prisoner Zero thing, and a whole other war-ridden life I couldn't remember.... I wasn't sure if he could, anyway.

I shook my head. I couldn't think like this, not when he had River—or will have River, because no matter how uncomfortable their flirting made me, it was still there. The flirting. I wanted to believe that it wasn't, pretend like it wasn't, but I knew there was probably only one real reason he let me travel with him in the first place. "Because I'm a Time Lord?" I insisted.

He shook his head. "Not just that."

I felt the slightest burst of hope. I was just about to ask what he meant when Amy walked back in and announced, "I want to go home."

The Doctor's face looked ashen as he gently pulled a lever down. "Okay."

A smile crept up on Amy's face. "No, not like that! I just... I just want to show you something. You're running from River. I'm running too."

I noticed the look on Amy's face, and remembered what would happen next. She was going to try and kiss the Doctor, and I wasn't going to be there for it. I didn't want to be. The Doctor was running from River. Amy was running from her marriage, which was actually her running from having to grow up. I stared at the two of them so close to each other and tried to ignore the clenching feeling I got in my chest much like the one I got when River was close to the Doctor. 

As I reached up my hand to press the crystal on my locket without any warning, I couldn't help but think that I was running away from everything, all at once.

**888**

When I ended up back in my locked room, the first thing I did was panic.

The noise of the TV was on, and I knew that meant my dad was finally home... if he was even my real dad anymore. I couldn't think like that. It didn't matter if he was my biological father or not, he was still my father to me, and he was in this house. God knows if he said anything when he walked in the house. Did he even notice I was gone?

I unlocked my bedroom door and walked out, seeing my dad sitting on the couch watching TV.

"Scarlette!" He exclaimed, standing up and walking over to hug me. I froze for just a second, once again having to get used to the fact that I would be called Scarlette in this universe, not Nova. "Are you doing alright, kiddo? You didn't say anything when I got here, I was about to break your door down," he chuckled.

I tried my best to keep any signs of worry off my face, and plastered a cheesy grin. What if one day he did break the door down and I wasn't there, and then had to explain myself when I magically reappeared? Not for the first or last time, I had to invent a quick lie. "Sorry, I was really exhausted. I didn't even notice. When did you get here?"

He walked over to the kitchen bar and began washing some fruits to eat. "About twenty minutes ago," he replied, and I had to stop myself from sighing of relief. He seemed to believe my lie, and he got here pretty early, seeing as to how I left before lunch, and now it was actually lunchtime. I noted the fact that the time differences between universes didn't make any sense compared to the one day – one hour scale I had noted last time, but then hoped that maybe time was just messed up since much of my previous adventure was kind of erased... from time.

"And I was going to ask you," he continued, shaking me out of the time difference equations I was trying to work out in my head, "If it was alright with you if Sally joined us for dinner."

I swallowed. I had forgotten about that while I was off on ridiculous adventures. I had a real life back here, where real things happened—like your dad wanting you to approve of his girlfriends, for instance. Of course I was fine with her, she was a field agent like my dad was, although that was all I knew about her aside from the fact that I remembered she had tan skin and tight curls the last time I saw her. 

Then I remembered someone else important in my life.

"Only if Meredith can sleep over," I piped, trying my best to show my dad that I was one hundred percent okay with everything. He really didn't need to worry about me crying when he got a girlfriend. I was an adult now, and I had come to terms with the fact that I wouldn't know who my mom was. Now I had an entirely different thing to come to terms with—the fact that whoever this mom I was talking about... may not have even been my real mom.

He nodded, smiling, looking reassured. "Sure thing."

After I finished eating some lunch with my dad, I went to my room and fell asleep.

 


	17. Vampires of Venice (pt 1) / Tests (pt 1)

It was obvious that the woman sitting on the throne was of the nobility. Not only was there the fact that it was a _throne_ she was sitting on, but in Venice 1580, she was able to carry herself with elegance even while sitting down, an inquisitive look on her face as she observed the two people walking towards her.

The man and his daughter curtsied before the woman, before the man spoke, getting directly to the point. He slightly feared the woman, but everyone did. Especially since she was known to be really strict about whom she accepted, and this... this was their only chance at a better life, a new beginning. "Signora, your school offers a chance for betterment, escape. My daughter..." the man nervously took off his cap, trying to show as much respect and class as he could. "Isabella is 17 now, but what prospects are there for the daughter of a boat-builder? There's no future for us. No future but you."

The woman looked down, hiding her smugness. "I am moved by your concern for your daughter. I believe protecting the future of one's own is a sacred duty."

"Signora," the man took his daughter's hand sincerely, "She is my world."

The woman smiled slightly, though not really making much of an effort. "Then we will take your world."

The man and his daughter looked at each other in disbelief, and laughed joyfully, hugging each other. "I knew it!" The man exclaimed, letting go of his daughter.

The woman stood suddenly. "Say goodbye to your daughter," she interrupted simply.

The man's face fell. "Now, Signora?"

"Why wait?" The woman shrugged, nodding to one of her guards.  "Time ticks."

The guard walked up to the man, signaling he had to go now. The man grabbed his daughter's hand quickly. "Be brave, my girl," he kissed her hand. "Make me proud," he told her, being escorted away.

As soon as Isabella's father was out the door, the woman turned to her sharply. "Step into the light, my dear."

Isabella walked forward hesitantly. Her father told her to be brave, but she couldn't keep the fearful look off her face when Francesco went to slam the door, and began circling around her with the woman, as if staring down prey.

"What say you, Francesco? Do you like her?" The woman asked.

"Oh, I do, Mother. I do," he replied, smiling, and then showing his fangs. Isabella screamed, realizing too late that staring down their prey was exactly what they were doing.

**888**

I wanted to think that I wasn't the worst daughter ever for being extremely overjoyed when dinner was over and I got to leave Sally's presence, but I probably was. I dragged Meredith (who had come over) back to my room so fast it was a shame.

Sally was nice and pretty and all, but she kept staring at me like I was going to burst out crying any second for no apparent reason, so careful, so observant-- and it was creeping me out. I didn't understand why she kept looking at me like that, so I kept shifting around awkwardly under her steady gaze. 

And of course, Meredith being Meredith, she was naturally shifting around awkwardly anyway. She made pleasant small talk, but most of the conversation at the dinner table was carried on by my father, who spilled the details of their oh-so-hilarious field mission, and Meredith's random inputs of, "That sounds nice, _"_ and "Oh, really?" here and there, just out of politeness.

But now that I thought about it, maybe the stale air and not-so-discreet looks of _freaking-say-something_ from my father were better than my situation right now, sitting on my fluffy purple carpet on the floor, staring up at Meredith who was sitting crisscrossed on my bed.

"Something happened to you," she observed sternly, giving me a scornful look, which was a strange juxtaposition to see on her soft pale features, "and you aren't telling me."

I shook my head. "Nothing happened," I denied. I wasn't completely sure what she meant by _something_ happening, but my mind instantly went to all my adventures with the Doctor and Amy. 

I knew I wanted to tell her everything, because she was my best friend, after all. She's important to me. I just didn't know how I would even begin.

Her expression became softer. "Scarlette, you can tell me _anything_. You know that, right? Something happened to you after the whole artifact incident and I know it."

I took a deep breath. I really hated hiding things from people, which was ironic considering both my line of work, which was entirely secret, and the fact that I was telling the Doctor virtually nothing about myself so far. I willed myself to believe her and figured that if I wasn't going to tell the Doctor, my father, or the US Government anything, the least I could do was tell my very best friend.

I took a deep breath, stood up, and plopped down on the bed next to her, crisscrossed also. "You're right," I simply stated.

Meredith looked like she was about to fire back, but then tilted her head down, raising an eyebrow and giving me a strange glare as if she couldn't tell whether I was being sarcastic or not. "I am?"

I nodded, grabbed her hand, and began explaining everything; from the moment I first pressed the crystal.

**888**

"Heeeyyy! It's me! Hello! How are you?" Rory shouted, holding his phone to his ear, his other hand pressing his other ear so he could hear better, since the background noise of his bachelor party was distracting him from the voicemail he was trying to leave his _extremely soon_ to be wife, Amy.

"The reason for this call is because I haven't told you for seven hours that I love you, which is a _scandal_ , and even if we weren't getting married tomorrow, I'd ask you to marry me anyway!" Rory laughed. His mates poking at him, gesturing to the giant cake that wasn't actually a cake being rolled out behind him, interrupted him. Rory blushed when he realized what it was, and what was in it. "Oh... Oh. Oh, blimey. I've... I've... I-I-I... I'll see you tomorrow!" He rushed, and hung up.

He walked up to the cake, fidgeting slightly. All around him, his friends along with many others who were obviously used to this were cheering, "Out, out, out!"

Rory nodded to himself, finally feeling somewhat prepared. After all, he didn't even know the girl who would be doing this, and would probably never see her again. But when a face he did know popped out from the cake instead, Rory figured there was definitely nothing in the world that could have prepared him for that.

"Rory! That's a relief. I thought I'd burst out of the wrong cake. Again. That reminds me, there's a girl outside in a bikini. Could someone let her in, give her a jumper? Lucy. Lovely girl." The Doctor gulped and whispered, "Diabetic."

Rory had finally stopped shaking his head and figured that now he was at least prepared for whatever the Doctor was going to say next. Only he wasn't. He never would have been. Not even after 2,000 years.

"Now, then. Rory. We need to talk about your fiancée," Rory smiled a little and pointed down at her face on his shirt, but instantly frowned when the Doctor leaned forward in the cake and stated, "She tried to kiss me."

Everyone in the room was either gasping or whispering, but none of it seemed to have fazed the Doctor. "Tell you what, though. You're a lucky man—she's a great kisser."

The Doctor finally realized that he was being embarrassing when a glass smashed, and he noticed everyone's shocked and maybe slightly disgusted expressions around him. "Funny how you can say something in your head and it _sounds_ fine..."

**888**

Meredith was looking down, slowly nodding, trying to take in everything I'd explained to her. It took awhile to convince her everything was real, but when I showed her my glowing hair and two hearts, she believed me.

Although for some reason, no one had seen my necklace on me before. But now that I was holding it in my hand, telling Meredith to look at it, she noticed.

She leaned in close, scrunching her eyebrows in curiosity, and then suddenly flinched back. "How did I not see that?" She wondered, her voice getting higher and squeaky like it always did when she was nervous.

I shrugged. I had a lot of different theories about it in my head, and now that she could actually see it, one of them was mostly confirmed. "Maybe it's a perception filter."

She shook her head. "I'm a computer girl, Scarlette," she reminded me. It was her way of telling me she didn't understand my _science talk_ , as she had always put it before. I always told her she could if she just learned. She was the smartest girl I knew—cracking NSA codes in seconds. She taught me some computer things, so I offered to teach her some science things—but she declined every time.

"It means you can't see it unless you already know it's there," I tried explaining.

I stared at her expectantly, waiting for a response. She almost looked worried. "What about Dylan?" She asked me.

I was slightly taken aback by that. I had just explained to her that I transported to an alternate universe where I turned into an alien and time traveled, and that I got there with this necklace I've been wearing this _whole time_ , yet she only just now seemed to notice. Somehow, she didn't have much to say about that. It seemed to make sense to her. Or at least I assumed it did, because now she seemed completely over it, asking me about my feelings that I may or may not have for Dylan for about the 20th time these past few days.

I gave her a strange look. "What about Dylan? Really? I just told you about a major scientific breakthrough that I'm not allowed to share with anyone, and you ask me about my non-existent love life _again_?"

Meredith smiled. "But it _does_ exist now! Dylan told me he's interested in you after you left this afternoon. He told me he has _plans,"_ she shared giddily.

I shook my head. " _What?_ "

"Yeah!"

I nodded. 

I didn't know what to think of that, because... I just didn't want to think about what it meant right now, not when the only thing on my mind was getting back to the Doctor, who I didn't know how I felt about either, or if it was totally wrong for me to even think about the possibility of feeling anything when he may or may not still have River. So I said goodnight to Meredith, and went over to the guest room. I wanted to sleep, but I remembered Time Lords didn't need nearly as much sleep as humans did, and still felt wide awake. 

I didn't think twice before pressing the crystal.

**888**

When I arrived in the TARDIS, I could feel that everything was silent until I got there, when a familiar man's voice yelped in surprise.

I squeezed my eyes tight, willing my headache that I always got when I switched universes to go away, and then looked wide-eyed at the man in front of me who was so surprised to see me he yelped. "Rory!" I exclaimed, smiling, trying to put him at ease. "How are you? Are you okay?"

Rory had a shocked expression, pointing at me and looking back to Amy. He kept opening his mouth like he was trying to say something, but no words would come out. With a spark from the floor below me, another voice greeted me. "Oh, Nova, just in time!" The Doctor yelled.

I looked down through the railing to see that he was doing something with a TARDIS piece that involved a tool that created sparks, and some thick dark goggles he had to wear. "I was just about to explain. The life out there, it dazzles. I mean, it blinds you to the things that are important. I've seen it devour relationships and plans..."

The TARDIS had a small explosion, and Rory made a nervous sound, stumbling forward a little. I stumbled a little too, just minus the nervous sound. It's like everywhere I go I create an awkward moment. "Oh! It's meant to do that," the Doctor assured him, and then continued right where he left off. "...because for one person to have seen all that, to taste the glory and then go back, it _will_ tear you apart. So...I'm sending Amy and Rory somewhere. Together."

Amy finally walked up next to me. "Woah, Woah-- what, like a date?"

"Anywhere you want, any time you want." The Doctor walked up the steps from the bottom level, joining us by the console. "One condition-- it has to be amazing. The Moulin Rouge in 1890! The first Olympic Games! Think of it as a wedding present, because, frankly, it's either this or tokens."

The Doctor took in Rory's stunned expression. "It's a lot to take in, isn't it? Tiny box, huge room inside. What's that about? Let me explain."

"It's another dimension," Rory muttered.

"It's basically another dimen... what?" The Doctor walked up to Rory.

"After Prisoner Zero, I've been reading up on all the latest scientific theories; FTL travel, parallel universes," Rory began explaining, but the Doctor cut him off.

"I like the bit when someone says, _It's bigger on the inside!,_ I always look forward to that," The Doctor frowned a little, looking almost like a sad puppy.

I couldn't help but smile. "Well  _I_ like smart people," I grinned to Rory. "Are you okay?" I asked again, and he smiled sheepishly back at me, and nodded.

Before anyone else could say anything more, Amy was walking around to us now. "So! This date. I'm kind of done with running down corridors. What do you think, Rory?"

"How about somewhere..." The Doctor pulled a lever down, setting the TARDIS in motion, and glanced to me for a second. "Romantic?"

**888**

The Doctor threw open the TARDIS doors, holding out his hands, while Amy, Rory and I followed out behind him and looked around the city in awe. "Venice! Venezia! La Serenissima! Impossible city. Preposterous city!" The Doctor explained. I giggled as someone tugging a goat walked past me, and began to follow the Doctor as he walked around and kept talking. "Founded by refugees running from Attila the Hun. It was just a collection of little wooden huts in the marsh, but became one of the most powerful cities in the world. Constantly being invaded, constantly flooding... constantly... Just beautiful! Oh, you gotta love Venice. And so many people did. Byron, Napoleon, Casanova. Oooh, that reminds me." The Doctor checked his watch. "1580. That's all right. Casanova doesn't get born for 145 years. Don't want to run into him. I owe him a chicken."

"You owe Casanova a chicken?" Rory asked. I would have asked the question myself, but I was busy trying to remember what would happen in this episode, and still being in shock at the city around us at the same time. I knew there was a thing with Narcissa Malfoy being fish queen or something, but I was trying to remember all the little details to see if I could... fix something. Again.

If I just remembered right now, then this time I wouldn't fail.

"Long story. We had a bet," The Doctor waved him off.

He was walking towards somewhere, when a short man stopped him. "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa! Papers, if you please. Proof of residency, current bill of medical inspection," he demanded us.

The Doctor handed him his psychic paper. "There you go, fella. All to your satisfaction, I think you'll find."

His eyes widened. "I am so sorry, Your Holiness. I didn't realize," The man apologized, curtsying.

The Doctor smiled. "No worries. You were just doing your job. Sorry, what exactly is your job?"

"Checking for aliens, visitors from foreign lands, what might bring the plague with them."

Amy looked up in exhaustion. "Oh, that's nice! See where you bring me?" She jabbed the Doctor's arm. "The _Plague!_ "

"Don't worry, Viscountess," the official curtsied again to her, and she sighed perfectly, as if she really was a Viscountess. I seemed to be the only one who noticed Rory glancing to her and the man in confusion and disbelief. "No, we're under quarantine here, no-one comes in, no-one goes out, and all because of the grace and wisdom of our patron, Signora Rosanna Calvierri," he pointed to the crest on the box he was carrying.

"I thought the plague died out years ago?" I wondered. I probably had my facts wrong again.

"Not out there!" The man pointed to the distance. "No, Signora Calvierri has seen it with her own eyes. Streets are piled high with bodies, she said."

"Did she, now?" The Doctor asked, in a tone that assured me I _didn't_ have my facts wrong. There was just something going wrong here.

The Doctor smiled and walked through the gates, and I followed him. I took the psychic paper from the man as I walked past him. "There's nothing on here," I stated. Even though I knew what a psychic paper did and everything, I expected to be able to see it now that I was really here.

The Doctor looked sideways at me and took the paper back. "You can't?"

I shook my head. "Nope."

"Really? That's strange. Even I can see it."

I shrugged. We approached a balcony, and looked out across the river to see women with umbrellas and veils walking in an extremely orderly fashion. I squinted at them. Something about their... form, seemed off, but I couldn't put my finger on it.

"That's the Calvierri girls," someone whispered. Amy turned to the Doctor and I with an adventurous grin.

When I looked out across the river to see a man chaotically searching through the girls and trying to look at their faces while shouting "Isabella!" over and over, I remembered what happened in this episode. I didn't even think—I just started moving, looking for the bridge to cross the river.

I was walking through the crowded streets when I felt a hand around my waist, pulling me to the side. I jumped a little, but quickly noticed that it was the Doctor. "This way," he spoke low in my ear, leading me to a narrower back road with more crooked cobblestones. Almost moments later, I noticed the man from before turning right into a different passageway. Only then did the Doctor move from beside me, and cross behind him to jump up the steps by the archway.

"Who were those girls?" The Doctor asked him.

The man turned around, and looked to the Doctor and I, defeated. "I thought everyone knew about the Calvierri School."

"We're kind of new here," I added.

The Doctor jumped down from the steps and moved next to me. "Parents do all sorts of things to get their children into good schools. They move house, they change religion," A man walked past us, and the Doctor moved closer to the man and whispered, "So why are you trying to get her out?"

The man stared into the Doctor's eyes at first, but quickly became lost in thought. "Something happens in there-- something magical, something evil. My own daughter didn't recognize me. And the girl who pushed me away, her face... like an animal." He frowned.

I put my hands on the man's arm gently in reassurance. "We'll figure it out," I nodded, turning to the Doctor. "Right?"

The Doctor nodded, smiling at me, and put his arm around the man's shoulder, turning him back. "I think it's time we met this Signora Calvierri."

**888**

Francesco stood lounging at the top of a stairway, arms crossed. He narrowed his eyes at the strange couple, wearing strange clothes, hair red and bronze, as they walked in front of him. There was something about them he knew wasn't right.

"Flowers, signor?" A young girl interrupted him, holding out dainty wildflowers to him.

Francesco shook his head, and the girl moved on, until he had a thought.

He walked down the steps stealthily, creeping up to the flower seller who was resting underneath the archway. She smiled softly, holding out a bunch of flowers to him again. He took them in his gloved hand.

**888**

Rory, who had finally reconciled with Amy, was taking a picture of her on his picture phone making a silly face, until a piercing scream was heard.

Amy's face changed from silly to curious and worried in a matter of milliseconds, while Rory felt frozen in place. "What was that?" he asked, but Amy was already running off.

He got up and ran after her, where they saw a man with fangs and blood on them staring at them wide-eyed. When he left, Rory didn't even think twice before going to help the girl who was bitten by the... creature, and Amy didn't think twice about chasing it.

She barely registered Rory telling her that the girl would be okay when she darted after the man, or vampire, and ignored his shouts to come back. She wanted to figure out who he was, and why—but just when she thought she had him, she came across a dead end at one of the canals.

She stared into the water, not being able to shake the feeling that somehow, someone was watching her through it.

**888**

A few minutes later, the three of us had developed a plan. While Guido kept yelling for his daughter, distracting the guards, the Doctor and I inched past the side of the building. The Doctor unlocked the side gate of his sonic, and we scurried in as quickly as we could. We made our way down some stone steps and into a dark chamber.

The Doctor looked to a mirror on the wall, so I turned the opposite way, my eyes going wide at the sight before me.

The girls were pale, dressed in white nightgowns. I reached behind me to touch the Doctor, needing to make sure he was still there. "Um... Doctor?"

When he turned around, the girls echoed simultaneously, "Who are you?"

"Woah," I breathed, turning back to the mirror, and looking back at them, just like the Doctor was doing. "How are they doing that?" I asked aloud, hoping the Doctor would have an answer.

"I don't know. But I," he turned to the mirror, "Am..." he turned back to the girls, "Loving it! You're like Houdini, only five scary girls. Only he was shorter. _Will_ be shorter. I'm rambling."

"What's up with their skin?" I asked the Doctor, not being able to shake the image of something reptile underneath them. "It's all... scaly."

He turned to me with a curious look, but didn't get to answer when the girls spoke. "I'll ask you again Signor, Signora. Who are you?" The echoed again, almost glaring at us. I was confused as to why they referred to themselves as one being, when they were obviously different girls. I hated to think that whatever took over them was so strong that even if you could see them, really, there was nothing left of them as individuals. Now, they weren't themselves anymore—as one, they were whatever it was that took over them.

"Why don't you check... _this_ out?" The Doctor asked, holding out a wallet.

The girls all tilted their head, glaring at the card in the wallet in confusion, so I took it from his hand and looked at it. "This is a library card," I handed it back to him, and then pulled out the psychic paper I took earlier from my pocket, and showed it to them.

They only stared at it the same way as before, tilting their head in confusion. "I don't think they care about credentials," I told him, and handed it back to him.

He took it and nodded. "Pale, creepy girls who don't like sunlight and can't be seen in..." he turned to look behind him in the mirror again, confirming that although they were standing right behind us, you couldn't see them in the reflective surface. "Are you thinking what I think I'm thinking?"

"If you're thinking... vampires." I knew what they were--- some weird fish-like aliens, which probably explained the reptile-ness I kept seeing. But they didn't explain why the Doctor couldn't see fluctuations, or why I was even able to see them in the first place. Not only that, but even though I knew what they were, they still strikingly resembled what you would expect your average vampire to be.

"But the city, why shut down the city? Unless..." The Doctor continued, but the girls cut him off.

"Leave now, or we shall call for the steward... if you are lucky," they smiled, but there was nothing nice about it at all.

"Ooh," the Doctor smiled back, intrigued, until they opened their mouths more, revealing sharp fangs, making hissing noises, reminding me all too much of Prisoner Zero. I stiffened. Normally, I would probably be excited at the cool fish-like aliens, but I couldn't take the reminder of the constant threat I was facing. We both moved back towards the stairwell we came from, but the Doctor spun back around. "Tell me the whole plan!" he tried, only to be met with louder hissing noises, the girls getting closer. They were slow, but it was still intimidating.

"That never works!" I reminded him. I really would have been smiling too, if it weren't for how I almost felt like I was staring Prisoner Zero in the face.

"One day that'll work," he mumbled to me. I tried pulling the Doctor back up the stairwell by his jacket, but he only took about three steps before turning back again.

"Listen, I would love to stay here. This whole thing... I'm thrilled. Oh, this is Christmas!" he smiled, before turning back again and ushering me to get out quickly.

**888**

"Doctor! Nova!" Amy yelled for us, running up to me first and grabbing me by the shoulders. "Nova, we just saw some vampires!"

"We did too, we met them!" I smiled back, finally allowing myself to be excited about it. After wandering around with the Doctor all day, the fear kind of wore off. 

I kept rambling on, about scaly skin and sweet smiles and the possibility of a cold-blooded human, while Amy just kept shouting about vampires. We were jumping up and down, smiling about our strange alien experiences like teenage girls who just met their favorite celebrity. I was glad to have a friend like Amy who would be excited over this with me, even if we were on slightly different wavelengths.

"We think we just saw a vampire!" Rory exclaimed, finally arriving, out of breath.

"I know! Amy was just telling me," I smiled.

"Yeah! The Doctor and Nova actually went to their house," Amy giggled, moving to hug the Doctor, earning a disheartened look from Rory she didn't notice.

"Oh. Right. Well..." Rory trailed, sounding defeated, but the Doctor cut him off.

"Okay, so," the Doctor slapped his hands on Rory's cheeks, "first we need to get back in there somehow."

"What?!" Rory exclaimed.

"How do we do that?" Amy asked, sounding much more calm than Rory was, ready for anything.

"Back in where?" Rory kept worrying.

I smiled, and raised my eyebrows at the Doctor. "Well, we know a guy..."

 


	18. Vampires of Venice (pt 2)

Guido put the map of Venice down on the table, The Doctor, Amy and I hunched over it while Rory sat in the back on some barrels. "As you saw, there's no clear way in. The House of Calvierri is like a fortress. But there's a tunnel underneath it," Guido pointed, tracing his finger through the path, "with a ladder and shaft that leads up into the house. I tried to get in once myself, but I hit a trapdoor."

"You need someone on the inside," Amy suggested.

"No," The Doctor replied instantly, sternly, not even looking up from the map.

"Oh, come on," I tried, growing frustrated at the fact that I couldn't figure out any other way to get in, and at how Amy had figured that out now.

"You don't even know what I was going to say!" Amy continued.

The Doctor looked up at her. "That we pretend you're an applicant for the school to get you inside and tonight you come down and open the trapdoor to let us in."

"Oh, so you _do_ know what I was going to say..."

"Are you insane?" Rory asked.

"We don't have another option," Amy pointed out.

"He said no, Amy. Listen to him," Rory tried from behind us.

"There _is_ another option..." Guido pointed over to where Rory was. Confused, Rory pointed at himself, not getting what he meant. "I work at the Arsenal. We build the warships for the navy."

The Doctor walked over to where Rory was sitting on a barrel, and sniffed around. "Gunpowder," he put a hand on Rory's shoulder, "Most people just nick stationary from where they work."

Rory slowly inched away from the barrels and stood up, while the Doctor walked around. "Look, I have a thing about guns and huge quantities of explosive," he warned.

Guido slammed his hands on the table. "What do you suggest, then?! We wait until they turn her into an _animal_?!" He turned away and poked at the fire angrily.

Amy shrugged from where she was sitting on the table. "I'll be three, four hours tops."

The Doctor gave a small smile at her persistence, but then quickly wiped it away. "No, no, no, no, no, no. It can't keep happening like this. This is how they go," The Doctor sat on the bed and put his head in his hands. I sat down next to him comfortingly, and he took a deep breath and leaned back, looking at me as he spoke again. "But I have to know. We go together," He turned to Amy. "Say you're my daughter."

"What? Don't listen to him!" Rory argued.

"Your daughter? You look about nine," Amy whined.

I gave a small chuckle at that, and the Doctor frowned at me playfully and poked me in the side, making me giggle even more.

"Brother, then." The Doctor suggested.

"Too weird. Fiancé," Amy replied. I raised my eyebrows at that. It was beginning to irritate me how she seemed to forget about Rory that way, and obviously, it was irritating him, too.

"Uh, I'm not having him run around telling people he's your fiancé," Rory interjected, pointing accusingly at the Doctor.

"No. No, you're right," Amy stood.

"Thank you."

"I mean they've already seen the Doctor," she turned to Rory abruptly, "You should do it."

"Me?" Rory questioned, not being sure whether she was joking or not.

"Yeah!" Amy smiled, "You can be my brother," she rubbed his head playfully.

Next to me, the Doctor smiled and tried to suppress a small chuckle at Rory's reaction. This time, I playfully poked him back in the side, and he smiled more.

Rory pointed accusingly at the Doctor again. "Why is him being your brother weird, but with me, it's okay?"

Suddenly, I had an idea, and blurted it before I really thought about it. "I'll go with her."

"No!" The Doctor turned to me sharply.

I gave him a strange look at his quick reaction. It didn't seem to matter too much at first when Amy wanted to go, so I didn't understand what the difference would be if I went. "Why not?" I asked, "We could protect each other. Rory could be both our brothers," I reasoned.

"You don't even look like his brother!" he complained to me. "Dark hair, dark eyes, olive skin, _American,_ and you're supposed to be _Amy's_ sister?"

I shook my head in disbelief. "So I'm adopted then! We'll be together. It would be better." The Doctor only stared at me in silence, and didn't respond, so Rory interrupted.

"This whole thing is mental! They're _vampires,_ for god's sake!"

"We hope," the Doctor added.

"So if they're not vampires...?" Amy trailed.

"Makes you wonder what could be so bad it doesn't actually mind us thinking it's a vampire," the Doctor replied, showing his top teeth for vampire emphasis, thankfully making me smile again, instead of reminding myself of what I knew they really were.

**888**

It was a really, really, odd sight to see Amy standing there wide-eyed, looking very uncomfortable in old fashioned clothes, Rory stuttering over his words, and me trying my best to look everywhere except at Signora Calvierri, or anyone in the room besides Amy and Rory. These people were probably all fish aliens, or on their way to becoming one. I was extremely surprised they seemed to be buying our act, or were at least having the patience to pretend to.

"So, basically," Rory started. I had to suppress a chuckle when I wondered how the TARDIS would translate that. "Our parents are dead from getting the plague, and she's our friend, but her parents are dead too, from... the plague," Rory motioned to me, since it was decided before that even if I didn't reveal my accent, my appearance looked too far from Amy's to be related to her. 

"I'm a gondola... driver..." Rory trailed, a little too slowly. I really did like him, but I desperately wanted to face-palm. And laugh... though that might be because of the nervousness. "So... money's a bit tight... so having my sister and our friend go to your school for special people would be brilliant," Rory nodded awkwardly, noticing Calvierri's bored and confused expression on the throne. "Cheers."

I stiffened as Francesco walked up to me and traced his finger under my chin lightly for a few seconds. I lifted my chin higher, trying not to show my disgust. He smirked and then circled around Amy. "Have we met?"

"I've just got one of those faces," Rory replied nervously.

"I wasn't talking to you," Francesco accused him.

"She's got the same face..." Rory continued, pointing to Amy and laughing nervously, really not helping, "Which is because she's my sister!"

Signora Calvierri turned to a servant with an annoyed look. "Carlo, explain yourself. Why have you brought me this imbecile?"

"Signora, they have references from the King of Sweden," he responded politely.

She looked interested now. "What? Let me see," she held her hand out expectantly, and Rory gave the psychic paper to her, which apparently had references from the King of Sweden on it. "Well, now I can see what got my steward so excited. What say you, Francesco? Do you like them?"

Francesco was circling around both Amy and I slowly now, staring at us like we were pieces of meat. I tried my best to hide my disgust. "Oh, I do, Mother. I do."

"Then we would be delighted to accept her. Say goodbye to your sister, and your friend," Calvierri told Rory. Rory and Amy gripped each other's hands for just a moment before Carlo was ushering a stuttering Rory out the door forcefully.

"Tell Uncle... Doctor...we'll see you both pretty soon, Okay?" Amy told Rory, as he nodded from the doorway. She turned to me, as if looking for assurance. "We'll be fine," she smiled.

Amy couldn't tell, staring at Rory, but behind her Francesco revealed his vampire teeth. "A-Amy!" Rory stuttered again, and the door slammed in his face.

**888**

As Amy and I followed the servant through the castle, the other girls in there walked up to us closely and just... stared at us, having no concept of personal space. The girls weren't afraid to show their teeth and hiss at us as we walked up the stairwell.

Eventually we made it to the bedroom, shared with other girls, where we saw Isabella sitting on a bed, staring at the wall blankly.

"There are clothes on the bed. Get changed and wait here," Carlo, the servant said to us, before ushering all the other girls out of the room who all complied, except Isabella. Eventually it was just Amy, Isabella, and I. I wasn't the only one staring all around the room, taking in the intricate detail of everything. It was one thing to see old art when it was already old, but another thing to see it entirely new.

"Blimey," Amy gasped, staring up at the opulent ceiling painted with complex designs. "This is private education, then?"

I walked closer to where Isabella was sitting, still staring blankly at the wall. "Isabella?" I asked, my voice coming out more gentle than I expected. "I'm Nova, and this is Amy," I introduced us.

"How do you know my name?" She asked.

"We know your father," I told her simply. There was no point in lying there.

I heard a door slam in the distance, and Amy sat on the bed behind her. "Listen, soon, we're going to get you out of here, but I need you to tell me what's going on. What is this place? What are they doing?"

"They, um..." Isabella grew nervous, taking sharp breaths. "They come at night. They gather around my bed and they take me to a room... with this green light and a chair with... with straps, as if for a surgeon."

"What do they do?" I asked her calmly. Calming people down enough to cooperate was one of the many skills I learned to master at 51.

Isabella shook her head. "I wake up here," she looked back to the wall, and I knew we had lost her again. "And the sun burns my skin like candle wax."

A bell chimed, marking the hour, and Amy and I looked to each other. I knew she wouldn't survive, but I couldn't remember why.

**888**

The Doctor was holding out a torch in front of him, climbing up stone steps with Rory following close behind. "Right, okay, I'll go first. If anything happens to me, go back—"

"What happened?" Rory interrupted him, feeling only slightly bad that he wouldn't care too much if anything happened to him right now. "Between you and Amy?" He asked, but the Doctor kept walking. "You said she kissed you,"

The Doctor stopped suddenly. "Now? You want to do this _now?!"_ The Doctor was a little anxious. He was worried too, but didn't want to think about it. He just wanted to get to them, so he ran up more steps to reach a wooden door.

"I have a right to know," Rory followed him. "I'm getting married in 430 years!"

**888**

When we got to the courtyard opening, I turned back to her. "Stay here and keep watch, I'll try and open the grate." She nodded, and I looked both sides before creeping out and opening the grate that was the trap door Guido mentioned that would get Rory and the Doctor in.

When I moved the first steel latch, I felt someone grab me from behind, and yelped. I started kicking him, but his grip on me was tight. "Stay back!" I screamed, once I realized that I was going to be taken away. I was hoping that Amy would understand I was telling _her_ to stay back, not the guard trying to drag me away, but she came around from behind and hit him in the head with her lantern.

As he fell down, unconscious, I looked up at Amy to see her grinning wildly. Only, it didn't last long, because then two other men came and grabbed us both, and we were dragged away.

**888**

The Doctor was still ahead of Rory, holding the torch and trying to explain himself as they walked down the dark tunnel. "She was frightened, _I_ was frightened, but we survived, and the relief of it... so she kissed me."

"And you kissed her back?" Rory asked, already knowing the answer.

"No. I kissed her mouth."

"Funny," Rory said back, in a way that implied he didn't find any of it funny at all.

The Doctor stopped walking for a second and turned back to him. "Rory, he kissed me because I was there. If Nova were there, she probably would have kissed her. It could've been you, it should've been you!" He tapped him on the chest and turned forward, walking on again.

"Yeah, it should have been me," Rory agreed begrudgingly.

"Exactly. That's why I brought you here." Just as the doctor said that, a strong gust of wind howled through the tunnel, blowing out the torch. The Doctor whispered, "Can we go and see the vampires now, please?"

**888**

Amy wouldn't stop kicking and screaming the whole way, yelling for the guard to take his hands off her, but I decided somewhere along the way that I would comply and stand straight, as regal and elegant as I could manage. I had a plan... almost.

"Psychic paper," Calvierri spoke. The lights turned on, and I recognized the room we were in both from the show, and from Isabella's description of it. It was a sickly green color, and Lady Calvierri was standing with her hands behind her back, completely calm, surrounded by Francesco and her girls.

"Did you really think that would work on me?"

**888**

"Push!" The Doctor told Rory, as he stepped on his head to get through the trap door. It was opened, just like they had planned.

"I'm pushing!" Rory complained back. The Doctor jumped out and walked back over to the grate, pulling Rory out.

"Come on, there we are." Once Rory was out, he began walking around the courtyard. "Nova!" He whisper-shouted, continuing to walk around. "Where's Nova?"

"Why are you only calling for Nova?" Rory asked, slightly irritated.

"There's two of us," the Doctor replied, still wandering around. "You can call for Amy, and I'll call for Nova."

Rory shook his head. He couldn't argue with that very much. "Can't see a thing," he noticed, and pulled out a tiny flashlight. "Good thing I brought this, then."

The Doctor pulled out a much longer light that glowed bright purple from his jacket. It was about as long as his arm. "Ultraviolet. Portable sunlight."

"Yours is bigger than mine," Rory observed, defeated.

"Let's not go there."

**888**

"No," I responded calmly.

Signora Calvierri shifted her attention from Amy to me, and narrowed her eyes. "Where are you from? Did you fall through the chasm?"

Francesco walked up to Amy. "Mother, this is pointless. Let's just start the process."

"Hold your tongue, Francesco! I need to know what these girls are doing in a world of savages with psychic paper," Calvierri told her son. Two girls brought in a wooden chair with wrist straps on it, and I started to get nervous. "Who are you with? I scarcely believe your idiot brother sent you." Calvierri continued. Francesco set a hook into an eye socket above the chair, and a girl attached an IV bag of what was probably filled with their blood to the hook.

"What are you doing in MY school?" Calvierri shouted at me again, getting closer to me.

"You said you fell through the chasm, right? Was it like a crack? Like a bright light breaking through?" I asked her.

"Yes. You know of the chasm?"

"Yes. She had one in her home, too," I gestured to Amy, hoping she would get the point. "You're saying you fell through it and then you ended up here?" I asked her.

"Yes," She responded again, walking closer to me. "What do you know of it?"

"Um," I responded. She was inches away from my face now, and even though I knew about it, I couldn't tell her. If I _did_ , things might go wrong, and she might get worse ideas. "Not—nothing," I stuttered.

She took a deep breath near me. "You aren't human, are you? I can _smell_ it," she spat, and then started laughing manically. "Put her in the chair!"

"No!" I yelled, beginning to struggle, before realizing that they were putting Amy in the chair instead of me. "What are you doing?!"

"No! Get your hands off me!" Amy struggled, as the girls tied her wrists down and Francesco held her head back.

"Oh, make sport of me, will you? Tease me as if I were your dog? Well, this dog has a bite, girl," When Calvierri turned around again, she showed her fangs.

"Nova!" Amy called for me, probably hoping I would do something.

"Stop!" I shouted, struggling against the person who was holding me back. "Get her out of there! Just-- put me instead! I'm not human, don't you want to know what it would be like?" I tempted them—anything to get Amy out of there. Even if she would be okay in the end, and I knew that, I couldn't just leave her there. She was terrified, and telling her it would be okay wouldn't help. She would think I'm betraying her, or that I don't care, and I do. So I had to try to do something.

"Yes, yes..." Calvierri trailed, walking over to me again. "But where are you from?"

I remained silent. I didn't know if I should say anything. I was afraid I wouldn't be able to handle it or know what to say, and not only that, but it would be too far off course from what was supposed to happen. I wasn't in the mood for taking _that_ many chances.

"Tell me, or I'll bite you right now, without the chair. You're right, I don't know how it works on non-humans. Could be worse," she touched my cheek with her nail, and then scratched it, leaving a mark. I flinched. "Could be painful."

I glared at her hard, ignoring the bleeding from my cheek that she created. I _was not_ going down without a fight. I smiled, and did what Amy would have done anyway, and kicked her, right where I knew her perception filter device was.

She stumbled back, her appearance fluctuating intensely between her human-self, and her fish-alien self. "You fool!" She screeched, and lunged toward me with her fangs showing. The last thing I remembered was Amy shouting for help and a sharp pain in my neck, before the world went black.

**888**

On top of everything else, Rory was also worrying about the state of his relationship with Amy. "If we cancel now, we lose the deposit on the village hall, the salsa band..." he sighed.

The Doctor was ignoring him, for the most part, concentrating on getting the girls out of there safely, and figuring the place out. He opened a chest on the ground to reveal skeletal remains inside.

Rory flinched back. "What happened to them?"

The Doctor held his light up to it and touched its hand. "They've had all the moisture taken out of them."

"That's what vampires do, right?" Rory figured. "They drink your blood and replace it with their own."

"Yeah, except they haven't just had their blood taken, but all the water in their bodies." 

"Why did they die? Why aren't they like the girls in the school?" Rory worried. Amy was in there with them, and people were dying in there.

"Maybe not everyone survives the process," the Doctor figured.

Rory walked away in frustration, and then turned back and pointed at the Doctor accusingly. "You know what's dangerous about you? It's not that you make people take risks. It's that you make them want to impress you. You make it so they don't want to let you down. You have no _idea_ how dangerous you make people to themselves when you're around."

The Doctor looked regretful, and was about to say something back when a chorus of familiar soft female voices asked, "Who are you?"

The girls appeared, each from their own archway, and the Doctor quickly went in front of Rory and held the light out in front of them as they got closer. "We should run," he figured, as they hissed at them. "Run!"

**888**

When I woke up, I was in a daze. I noticed that Amy was still yelling, and Francesco was touching my neck now.

"No, stop..." I said lightly, but I couldn't find enough strength to move away. When my vision became less blurred, I noticed that Calvierri was standing in front of me now, licking her teeth and grinning.

"I'm afraid it's too late," she grinned, and I felt gross. Even if all she did was... take blood from me, or whatever, and I didn't remember it, I felt wrong. I felt... violated, and I wanted to cry. But I wouldn't. Instead, when Francesco stood in front of me, I kicked him too. When he stumbled back towards Amy, she kicked him also, and he fell to the ground.

He sat up, only slightly bruised, and Lady Calvierri began holding me back. "You fear one man?" She laughed, speaking into my ear. "If you survive, there are 10,000 husbands waiting for you in the water."

"Really? You try that, I know there's one man _you_ should fear," I warned her. Obviously she wasn't going to be afraid of me anymore.

She was about to respond when I heard the sound of glass shattering, and a familiar voice saying, "Come on, Rory!"

Calvierri looked startled at the noise, and rushed out of the room immediately, Carlo the servant, and a limping Francesco following her. I ran over to Amy and started getting her wrists out of the chair as soon as Calvierri let go of me. "Are you okay?"

" _Me?_ " Amy asked incredulously. "You're the one who got bit by a vampire alien!"

As I was struggling to get one tie off her wrist, someone else rushed in and worked on the other one. Amy yelled, and then realized it was Isabella. As soon as Amy was free, Isabella starting running. "Come on!"

Amy and I immediately ran after her. We were crossing through hallways that seemed only slightly familiar, and I wasn't focused on anything but Isabella, until Amy yelled for Rory and turned a different way.

I turned to see that the Doctor was there, and called for him, grabbing his arm and pulling him back before I realized what I was doing. Somehow, the girls and Calvierri had him and Rory surrounded in that hallway, but thankfully there was another way. "Quickly, through here!" Isabella told us, leading us through more dark hallways, and a tunnel.

"What's with the light saber?" I asked the Doctor as we ran, "And why can't I look straight at it?"

"Ultraviolet," he waved the light around. "Portable sunlight to use against the vampires."

"They're not vampires!" Amy yelled back to the Doctor, as he soniced doors shut behind us.

"What?"

"We saw them, they had this perception filter thing and I kicked it, and kind of broke it. They're aliens. Like bugs with a fish head!" I exclaimed, now getting excited and relieved that I was finally able to say what they really were out loud. Even if we were still running, I felt safer now.

The Doctor chuckled. "Aliens. Classic."

"That's _good_ news? What is wrong with you people!" Rory shouted. 

We ran through a narrow hallway, and Francesco and the girls were close behind us. 

When I heard a bell tolling ahead of us, and a saw a light at the end of the tunnel, I finally remembered what would happen to Isabella, and was determined to stop it, turning around sharply.

"Doctor, your jacket!" I shouted to him.

"What?" He asked, not understanding what I meant.

I pushed past Rory and caught up to the Doctor, who was at the end of the line. This was it. I knew what was going to happen now, and it would actually come in handy. I could stop it, I could finally fix something. "Just give me your jacket!"

He stared at me, not exactly getting what I meant but handed me the ultraviolet light saber he was holding and took it off anyway. I gave him back his light and took the jacket from him. "Thanks!" I shouted, then fought my way past everyone to the front, where Isabella was.

Just as I remembered, Isabella was about to get out, when she flinched and hissed at the sunlight, covering her eyes with her arms. Coming up behind her, I threw the Doctor's jacket over her head. "There, come on!" I told her, grabbing her hand and leading her down the steps quickly.

Although she was hiding under the jacket, she still saw her father again, who was waiting around the corner. They embraced, so I stepped back. I turned around, only turning to see that Amy and Rory were having a moment, too.

I felt kind of... left out, until someone abruptly spun me around and hugged me tight, and I felt warm. "Brilliant, you are," The Doctor said, not letting go of me for a while. When he did, he was smiling brightly, until he noticed the scratch on my face that Signora Calvierri gave me, before she bit me.

He held my face in his hands, and gently traced his thumb over the scar where she scratched me so hard I bled. His expression was careful and... worried, two things I wasn't used to seeing on him at the same time. I knew he had seen the mark on my neck from where she bit me, and he looked at me softly, as if asking for permission. He slowly moved my hair back, so the mark could be seen. "Did she replace your blood with hers?" He asked me, quietly.

I never thought I would have to answer that question in my entire life, and it was so strange hearing it all I was able to do was shake my head no. 

His expression darkened, jaw tensed, and I couldn't understand why. There was something mad in his eyes, but it seemed to go away slightly when he said, "Get everyone back to Guido's house, I'll meet you there," and ran off before I could say anything else.

 


	19. Vampires in Venice (pt 3)

Signora Calvierri walked back into her school to find a man sitting on a throne. Not just any throne, _her_ throne. She paused and looked up at him, slightly surprised, slightly shocked—but mostly too amused to be as angry as she should be. He wolf whistled at her.

"Long way from Saturnyne, aren't you?" He tapped on her throne, marking each word that came next. "Sister of the Water?"

Signora squinted at him. "No, let me guess, the owner of the psychic paper." The man shrugged and showed his hands, as if pleading guilty. "Then I take it you're a refugee, like me?"

The Doctor, still sitting smugly on the throne, didn't reply to that question. He supposed that in a way, he was one, but he wasn't like her. He was here for one reason, but he knew that he needed to seem a certain way around women like Signora Calvierri, or he wouldn't get any answers. He knew how this worked. "I'll make you a deal. An answer for an answer."

She nodded with a smile, and he knew that the game had begun.

"You're using a perception filter. It doesn't change your features, but manipulates the brainwaves of the person looking at you. But seeing one of you for the first time in, say, a mirror, the brain doesn't know what to fill the gap with, so leaves it blank... hence no reflection."

Signora raised her eyebrows. "Your question?"

"Why can we see your big teeth?" He asked, smiling just a little, because it was Nova who was wondering that. Actually, she wouldn't stop talking about it while they were walking around town. She was so curious about the smallest things. And the biggest things. And everything, really... and he remembered why he was there.

She laughed. "Self-preservation over-rides the mirage. The subconscious perceives the threat and tries to alert the conscious brain."

"What did you do to Nova?" He asked quickly, trying not to look mad, trying not to show how he was growing impatient.

"My turn," she interrupted, smirking. "Where are you from?"

"Gallifrey," he responded promptly.

Her expression changed, showing just the slightest bit of awe. "You should be in a museum," she gaped, and the Doctor let out the smallest chuckle. "Or in a mausoleum," she added, but she was smiling.

"Why are you here?" he asked her.

Her smile faded. "We ran from The Silence. Why are you here?"

"Wedding present," he muttered quickly, before asking, "The Silence?"

She began pacing, lost in thought. "There were cracks. Some were tiny... some were as big as the sky. Through some we saw worlds and people and through others we saw silence... and the end of all things. We fled to an ocean like ours and the crack snapped shut behind us... and Saturnyne was lost." She frowned, looking down in regret.

"So Earth is to become Saturnyne Mark II?" The Doctor guessed, disgusted.

If she noticed his tone of voice, she did a great job of ignoring it. "And you can help me," she looked up hopefully. "We can build a new society here, as others have. What do you say?"

"Hmm," the Doctor stood up and walked to face her. He walked up so close to her that they were inches apart, narrowing his eyes at her just a moment, intimidating, and then moved behind her. The game was over. He gave up trying to listen to her side of the story, because he already knew it all too well. He had to know. "What did you do to Nova?"

"Nova?" She asked. She tried to mask her worry by pretending she didn't know who he was talking about. It's true, she never would have guessed who she was before, but now it all made sense. And now she was afraid.

"My friend. The girl who saved Isabella." Now he was facing her again.

"The girl with... red hair?" Signora wondered falsely. She knew very well Nova did not have red hair.

The Doctor didn't sense what she was thinking, though, and became angry, realizing something about Signora Calvierri. "No, the other one."

"Depends," she smirked. She wanted to hear him say it. "Where is _she_ from?"

The Doctor narrowed his eyes. "She's also from Gallifrey. "

"Oh," Signora raised her eyebrows. "So you're not the last. And she's... _just_ your friend?" She tilted her head at him challengingly.

The Doctor wasn't responding, he was just staring at her with anger, and it took a lot for her to not fidget under his dark stare. She tried to hold her ground, but it was too much. She sighed. "We removed her blood but we didn't replace it." She explained simply. He kept staring at her. That much was obvious, he needed more than that.

She realized that he wasn't going to say anything and wasn't going to leave until she gave him more information, so she just shrugged playfully. It wasn't going to be _that_ easy. "I've never had a Time Lord before. It was refreshing," She smiled at him.

He stepped closer to her. She repelled him, by what she did. And hearing her say it like that, like Nova was just a thing to be used..." _What_ did you do?" He growled quietly.

She noticed him growing even angrier than before, and not hesitating to show it this time. She glared at him, getting sick of this game. It didn't matter anymore, the girl, Nova, probably wasn't capable of anything yet if Rosanna herself was alive and well, having this conversation... which meant there was still a chance. "Nothing. Removed a few white blood cells, at the most," she grunted, giving in, before changing the subject quickly. "I need an answer, Doctor. A partnership." He was somehow still managing to get closer to her, looking angrier by the second, when she smiled. "Any which way you choose."

His voice was eerily low for someone who looked like they were about to burst, but he didn't need to shout for her to understand what he was going to say was final. "I don't think that's such a good idea."

Rosanna figured it wouldn't work, but it was worth a try. She turned away from him. "Carlo!" She called for her servant and he stepped out. She whipped back to face him. "You're right, it isn't a good idea. We're nothing alike. I will bend the heavens to save my race, while you? Philosophize." She spat.

He glared at her. "This ends today. I'll tear down the House of Calvierri, stone by stone. _Especially_ now." The servant put a hand on his chest to get him to move, but he pushed him away, still glaring at Signora Calvierri. "Take your hands off me," he turned to look at him, "Carlo."

He turned and walked out to the door himself, Carlo still following close behind anyway, but stopped to look back at her. "And you know why?" He paused, channeling all his anger towards her into one sentence, "You didn't know Nova's name!" He shouted.

Carlo opened the door behind him, and he took a deep breath and willed himself to calm down. "You didn't know Nova's name," he repeated, one last time, before storming quickly out the door, and out the gates.

**888**

Rosanna moved through the castle, the last sentence the Doctor spoke to her repeating in her head.

_You didn't know Nova's name._

She almost wanted to laugh. She knew Nova's name, she knew what it meant, and she knew the power it held. She thought it was a package deal of sorts. If you knew the silence, you knew Nova. So it worried her greatly that the person who seemed to be closest to her knew nothing of the silence... and if he didn't, he figured they were more of a threat than she thought, and had no time to waste.

Immediately, Signora entered another room of the castle. It was time for a change of plans. "Attend! Attend!" She called, and the girls, her son, and other servants stepped out below her, looking up to see her smiling at the top of the staircase.

"The storm is coming!" She spread her arms and smiled, beginning to walk down the steps. Only, when she did, the sound of something whirring and electricity foreign to this time period pierced the room. Her perception filter faltered, and her alien form was revealed. Carlo jumped back, afraid, and Signora screamed in frustration.

Francesco stepped closer to her, trying to act discreet, as if nothing had happened, while she was standing there looking like a fish. "Mummy... What's wrong with your perception filter?"

"That idiot child must have damaged it when she kicked me...!" It glitched again, but she fixed the device and went back to normal. "Now..." She sighed. "Assemble the girls. I have a job for them," she smiled.

**888**

Back in Guido's house, the Doctor was back. He held his sonic screwdriver to the bite marks in my neck, and then flicked it up to check the readings. "You're fine," he told me.

"What about me?" Amy asked him.

"Yes, right. Open wide," he told her, and she opened her mouth. He slipped a candy in, and she gave him a strange look, but seemed content to be eating it anyway.

Suddenly, the Doctor shouted, and began pacing in frustration. "I need to think. Come on brain, think, think. Think!" He sat down at the end of the table, next to Amy and Rory. "Think!"

"If they're fish people it explains why they hate the sun," Amy figured, sounding a bit funny with the candy still in her mouth.

The Doctor covered her mouth with his hand. "Stop talking, brain thinking. Hush."

"It's the school thing I don't understand," Rory added, only for the Doctor to cover his mouth with his other hand also.

"Stop talking, brain thinking. Hush."

"I say we take the fight to them!" Guido added fiercely. Even though his daughter had been saved, so far I noticed that he was still having the same responses, still passionate on revenge. Although the more human side of me was completely overjoyed and relieved that I finally got to save someone, the science side of me was slightly concerned. 

Isabella was alive now, which was great, but she wasn't supposed to be. Every life makes a difference, and I knew that. I was glad she was here now, believe me, after all the terror with the angels, I was so happy she was alive, that something finally went _right._ I knew in my heart that it should have been the right thing to do. But somehow, I couldn't stop the feeling in the back of my mind that I had done something incredibly _wrong_.

"So do I," Isabella added, not as loud as her father, but with a darker tone. I furrowed my brows anxiously. I didn't want her to get hung up on revenge, because I feared the worst could happen. 

Thankfully, the Doctor stopped them talking also. "Ah-ah-ah!" He interrupted.

"What?" Guido asked.

"Ah!" The Doctor interrupted again, nodding at Rory, who placed his hand over Guido's mouth. Isabella shrugged, and covered her own mouth. The Doctor continued. "Her planet dies, so they flee through a crack in space and time, and end up here, then she closes off the city and, one by one, changes people into creatures like her to start a new gene pool. Got it. Then what? They come from the sea, they can't survive forever on land, so what's she going to do?"

"Well—" I started with an idea of how to slowly share something, but then shook my head and sighed. Not only because the Doctor wasn't letting anyone talk, but because I didn't really know if it would work anyway.

"Yes?" The Doctor asked me. I looked up, a little surprised.

I chewed my lip a little nervously, but figured it was worth a try, and started hestiantly. "Well... She could change the environment. And send the girls over here to attack us. We're all in the same place, and they're vampire fish who know what mine and Amy's blood smells like," I added. I knew he would figure out the environment part, but I needed to remind him that we would probably be attacked very soon.

"Why does she get to talk?" Amy whined, sounding muffled by the Doctor's hand.

"Hush! She helps," he explained to her, before turning back to look at me. I blinked at that. "Of course... she said, _I shall bend the heavens to save my race._ "

While the Doctor seemed to get lost in thought, moving his hands to Rory and Amy's heads to make them nod, repeating " _bend the heavens_ ," I stood up and walked over to the window. The girls would come here, through this window, and I knew it. I just didn't know what to do about it.

"She's going to sink Venice," the Doctor realized, still sitting at the table behind me.

I looked out the window, around the town, at the children dancing in the street below, dancing in the sunlight, and got an idea.

"She's... she's going to sink Venice?" Guido asked.

"And repopulate it with the girls she's transformed," The Doctor explained.

"You can't repopulate somewhere with just women. You need... blokes." Rory added.

I turned around just in time to notice the bitter, dangerous expression on Isabella's face. I recognized it quickly. Even though I was in the past in a different universe in Europe, I recognized it as the face of someone who got recklessly angry because of someone that did them wrong.

I noticed it on the faces of the people who would be put on trial at 51 for being fed up with being holed up in the organization and did something disastrous in revenge. The directors, our mysterious group of leaders, were in charge of it all. The thing is, most them worked with us—we just didn't know that they were also directors. Some people risked CIA prison for life if it meant getting a trial, because at every trial, one more director was revealed. Although many people hated the directors, and many would stop talking to them once they figured their co-worker was one, spiteful words and glares and broken friendships were nothing compared to the punishment the offender got. The directors held their heads high, uncovered or not, and the offenders almost never won. The rest of us had to sit in that large auditorium and watch as they fell apart.

You do something reckless, and then, one way or another, you fall apart. That's just how it goes. I wasn't going to let that happen—not to Isabella and Guido, not to Amy and Rory, not to me, not to the Doctor.

"She's got blokes. 10,000 husbands waiting in the water," Isabella added.

"Only the male offspring survived the journey here." The Doctor realized. "She's got 10,000 children swimming in the canals, waiting for Mum to make them some compatible girlfriends." The Doctor cringed. "Ugh. I mean, I've been around a bit, but, really, that's... that's... Ew,"

I sat back down on the bench next to the Doctor, my back to the rest of the table. "Hey, Doctor, can I see that... portable sunlight, again?" I asked him.

He somehow took the thing out of his inner jacket pocket and handed it to me. I held it in my hands and spun it around, looking at it carefully. "What happens if you break it?"

"Then the liquidized ultraviolet leaks out." He explained.

"Okay... and what happens if it gets on someone? Say, a fish?" I asked.

The Doctor clasped his hands together on the table. "Well, with their skin, it's easier for the silver chloride to get to their internal systems in a matter of seconds, and since they have mesencephalon, they..." He raised his eyebrows at me, as if he knew I could finish the sentence.

"Shrink?" I guessed slowly, stretching out the word.

"Exactly," he responded, smiling, right when a loud clattering noise sounded from the floor above. Everyone else looked up, except me. I looked to the window in front of me, waiting. "The people upstairs are very noisy," the Doctor commented.

Guido seemed frightened. "There aren't any people upstairs."

The Doctor pointed at Guido. "I _knew_ you were going to say that, did anyone else know he was going to say that?"

"I did." I responded, still staring at the window.

Wood creaked, as if someone was walking around the upstairs level that didn't exist. Rory looked up. "Is it the vampires?"

"Like I said, they're not vampires. Fish from space." The Doctor corrected him.

There was a loud thump and the sound of glass breaking when some converted girls entered the room. "Aren't we on the second floor?" Rory asked.

The girls at the window continued breaking the glass. I ran over to them with the light, which held them back a little, and I cowered as they all hissed at me. "Doctor!" I shouted for him. The plan wouldn't work unless they were in their fish form.

He ran up next to me and used the sonic on them, revealing their true form. "Sorry about this!" I told him, before smashing the light against the windowsill, making the glass break apart, and then flicking it at them, so that the liquid sprinkled out and hit them, shining on their skin like breaking open a glow stick. They shrunk to about the size of my hand within seconds of the liquid hitting them, so I turned around and haphazardly attacked the other girls around the room with it while the Doctor soniced them, until they were all small.

I smiled a little at my victory, and then yelped and dropped the light in disgust before the liquid touched me the light melting like melting ice cream. "I ran out!"

"Move, come on!" The Doctor shouted, and we all went down the narrow stairwell. There were still some girls up there I didn't shrink, and it wouldn't be long until they ran after us.

"Is there another lamp?" Guido asked, and the Doctor pulled a smaller, normal flashlight out of his pocket.

Guido stopped at the door. "Stay away from the door, Doctor!" He warned us, shutting the door and locking us out.

The Doctor pounded on the door. "No! Guido! What are you doing?! I'm not leaving you! What are you doing?!"

I gulped and looked up at the building. I knew what he was going to do. All those barrels of gunpowder he stored in there were going to be put to use. The Doctor was still relentlessly shouting and pounding at the door, but I knew it wouldn't do any good. I took one of his hands and walked backwards. "Doctor, the barrels!"

He turned to me and realized what I meant, and we ran ahead to the small archway, which was as far as we could make it when I felt the ground rumble. 

As soon as I felt it, the Doctor pushed me to the wall and I felt him press against me, his hands on the wall next to my head, covering me from the explosion. I closed my eyes tight and only felt the heat of the fire and some pricks of debris. After it ended, though, we hadn't moved, and I refused to open my eyes.

"I—I couldn't," I stammered, awkwardly out of breath, not even sure what I wanted to say anymore, just feeling overwhelmingly _sorry._ But a single tear falling from my face, even with my eyes still closed, said everything.

"Shh," the Doctor whispered, wiping the tear away with the pad of his thumb. Slowly, I opened my eyes to look at him, and saw a million different words written across his face. Worry, wonder, determination. All we did was stand there like that, together, and I couldn't think of anything with how close he was to me. It was probably only seconds, but it felt like hours until Isabella approached and the Doctor stepped away from me.

I walked next to her and hugged her from the side while she stared at her scorched house solemnly, and numbly. Amy and Rory walked behind the Doctor, joining us all in staring at the damage while the people behind us clamored in the streets. "Rosanna's initiating the final phase," The Doctor realized, looking up to the unnaturally cloudy sky.

While everyone was staring at the damage with varying forms of distress, Amy just seemed very simply determined. "We need to stop her. Come on!"

"No, no. Get back to the TARDIS," The Doctor stopped her.

"You can't stop her on your own."

The Doctor was shouting now. "We don't discuss this! I tell you to do something, Amy, and you do it! Huh?"

I didn't have to see Amy's face to know how disappointed she was when she stormed off. Rory stayed behind just a moment later, telling the Doctor "Thank you," before following after her.

"I have some cousins," Isabella said to me, and I looked to the Doctor as if asking if he needed any help.

He nodded at me, and still hugging Isabella I turned away and began walking with her. "Let's go find them."

**888**

We weren't there yet when Isabella turned to me. "I can make the rest of the way, thank you. But you should go, to him."

I shook my head. "What? Isabella, he's fine, you—"

"He needs you." She nodded at me, taking my hands in hers. "Thank you, Nova."

I furrowed my eyebrows. I couldn't tell if it was right to leave her, or if I was just worrying too much.

As If answering my thoughts, she began walking away from me. "Go," she told me, and I went.

**888**

I made it to the Doctor just in time, following right behind him as he went up to open the throne, revealing alien circuitry and pulling out his sonic screwdriver. He finally noticed I was there right as Rosanna entered the room.

"You're too late," she said. I turned around to see her regal form, and although I've seen her before, something about her in that moment, with the rainy weather outside and the nearly empty throne room, made me tense up with memory.

**888**

_Out of all the days, it just had to rain_ today _didn't it? It's like the universe just wanted to laugh in my face even harder._

_She dragged me out of dinner and to the empty lobby the moment she had found out what happened. Even though she was wearing a delicate, long, corseted dress—she still looked deadly in it as she scolded me. "Nova, I know you think you're doing the right thing, but you're not. There are rules you must follow, and out of all the people in there you should know best."_

_I threw my hands up in distress. I was sick of doing nothing, I was sick of being used and pretending like I was just some girl who twirled around and went to dinner parties all the time. Sometimes I wish I were, because then my life would probably be easier, but it wasn't._

_"_ _And I, out of all the people in there, have a role to play here. I can't just leave them there! No matter how many rules I break. People's lives are more important than ancient words and empty threats!" I shouted back. Two years ago, I wouldn't have dared to raise my voice against her. But now, everything was different. So much has changed, and I knew that we couldn't go back to the way it was before, no matter how much I wanted to._

_She knew that too. Everyone did, but that didn't stop her from grabbing me by the arm, and pulling me closer. "Maybe you don't care of my threats, but what of your father's? There's rumor that he knows what you've been doing, Nova." She whispered to me._

_I stiffened. For the first time in two years, I couldn't push away what I was feeling._

_I was scared._

**888**

Oddly, the vision didn't feel like it was over, but I snapped back to reality anyway upon the ground quaking. I almost fell, but Amy and Rory were at my side, grabbing my arms. "What--?"

"What was that?" Rory asked.

"Nothing," the Doctor dusted himself off, "bit of an earthquake."

"An earthquake?" Amy grumbled.

"Manipulate the elements, it can trigger earthquakes. But don't worry about them." The Doctor tried.

I regained my footing and slowly walked over to the throne that belonged to Rosanna that was now open and full of alien circuitry. "So what do we worry about?" I asked, not really paying that much attention, a bit entranced by the glowing purple wires in the chair.

"Worry about the tidal waves caused by the earthquake," the Doctor rushed, now turning around to face me, his face along with Amy and Rory's stricken with worry.

"Okay, well, this thing... controls the weather, doesn't it?" I guessed, both from my knowledge and what I remembered.

"Right," The Doctor replied.

"So what do we do?" Amy asked.

The Doctor ran over to me and began looking around at the wires. "Rosanna's throne is the control hub but she's locked the program, so tear out every single wire and circuit in the throne. Go crazy. Hit it with a stick, anything."

Rory and Amy also ran up to the throne and began poking around and ripping out the wires too. The Doctor looked to me. "We need it to shut down and re-route control to the secondary hub, which I'm guessing will also be the generator."

**888**

After Amy, Rory and I finished relentlessly pulling at the wires in the control hub to the point where sparks flew, we ran out in the pouring rain and looked to the top of the tower to see the Doctor climbing up cables. "There he is!" Rory pointed out.

Slowly, we witnessed him open a spherical device, holding our hands over our heads to try to keep looking up while the rain poured down on us.

I couldn't really see, but eventually, something clicked, and the sun shined again. I smiled and jumped excitedly, but then I remembered... "Oh my god," I told Amy. She looked at me from behind Rory, confused, but didn't stop me when I turned and ran in the other direction.

**888**

Signora Calvierri was slowly walking to the water's edge, only in her chemise, dramatically staring down at the fate she was going to give herself. It was a somber moment, but I didn't care. I yelled "Hey!" before stopping for breath.

Shortly thereafter, I heard a familiar voice call "Rosanna!" behind me.

She didn't turn back to look at us, only kept staring at the water, completely still on the wooded plank. "One city to save an entire species. Was that so much to ask?"

"I told you, you can't go back and change time. You mourn but you live. I know, Rosanna, I did it," he told her gently, slowly inching closer to her.

Finally, she turned her head to look at him. "Tell me, Doctor, can your conscience carry the weight of another d—"

She stopped her sentence when she saw me, but I knew what she was going to say. Another dead species. Another dead race. Neither of them were sure that I knew what he had done, but I didn't know how to explain that I _did_ know... that I understood. I figured there was no way to explain without giving away everything else.

She looked at me silently for a few moments, slowly furrowing her brows, as if she was just noticing something.

She looked at me silently for a few moments, slowly furrowing her brows, as if she was just noticing something. "Silence will fall." She stated simply. She didn't try to say it in a menacing way; she just said it as a simple fact.

"I know." I told her.

"But do you know how?" She asked me, smiling just a little, as if looking at a little girl.

I stepped closer to her. "What's that supposed to mean?" I wanted to know more, but I didn't want to lose this opportunity. "Look, Rosanna, it doesn't matter, just step away from the water and we can help you."

Her smile faded, but she turned around slowly. She almost began walking, until a familiar cry of "No!" Was heard behind me.

It all happened too fast. She was walking towards us one second, and the next Isabella pushed past me and attempted to push Rosanna in the water. I would never know whether or not she meant to, but they both fell into the water together, never to be seen again. The Doctor ran to the edge, kneeling down. "No!" He yelled, laying on the plank and staring at the bubbling water as if he was looking for something in it, but the water died down quickly, and there was nothing.

He stood up slowly and looked at me, but it was all over now, and there was nothing left to be said.

**888**

All around us, the townsfolk were cleaning up after the storm, picking up baskets and putting things back where they belonged. I wanted to think about Isabella, I wanted to make sense of it, but ever since we left the castle—the Doctor hasn't let me, and I knew it. He was talking a lot more than usual so I didn't have time to think about it, and at the moment... I was glad.

I didn't want to feel like it was my fault anymore. I was sick of justifying all these things to myself, but I had to anyway. I thought about what River said to me before, and figured, it was supposed to happen... maybe I couldn't change it... maybe I wasn't supposed to... maybe I tried my best... maybe—

"Now, then, what about you two, eh? Next stop Leadworth Register Office? Maybe I can give you away." The Doctor clasped his hands together and smiled, cutting off my thoughts once again.

Rory slowed down behind us, and I turned to see him somewhat crestfallen, looking to Amy. "It's fine. Drop me back where you found me. I'll just say you've..."

"Stay...with us. Please. Just for a bit." She cut him off, her shy smile becoming excited. "I want you to stay."

Rory seemed somewhat lost for words, so filling in the silence, I encouraged them, trying to hide how much I knew he should stay. "I do too."

"Fine with me," The Doctor agreed.

"Yeah? Yes, I would like that!" Rory nodded, a smile growing on his face, and on all of ours, too.

"Nice one!" Amy smiled back, kissing him. "I will pop the kettle on. Come on, Nova," She called to me, unlocking the TARDIS door. She was about to go inside, and I was about to follow her, when she stopped to look back at them.

"Hey, look at this. Got our spaceship, got our boys..." She raised her eyebrows at me and smirked. "Our work here is done."

 


	20. Amy's Choice (pt 1)

One of the very first things I ever learned in science class that made me excited, was Newton's Three Laws of Motion. I quickly realized that these three laws not only made sense in the physics world, but they also made sense in the real world—with people and places and events. I've never been that good at story telling, but I've always been good at science.

Newton's First Law states that an object at rest will remain at rest, and an object in motion will remain in motion—unless acted upon by an external force. This is how I figure my own life out: I connect things to the scientific rules I already know. Just like some people relate themselves to characters, I relate myself to science. There's Amy and Rory, the Doctor, and me. Who's at rest, who's in motion, and who's the external force?

At rest, were Amy and Rory.

This much was obvious just by looking at the small village they live in, and the quaint little house they were staying at. I went into the kitchen to see a very pregnant Amy simply stirring away at some contents in a bowl that smelled good even in their raw state. "All unpacked?" Amy smiled to me.

I smiled back and moved to sit on the counter. "Yup. Thanks so much for letting me stay here, honestly, they have me all over the place—and the hotels in Leadworth, well, they're not really hotels, are they?"

Amy laughed. "Yeah, no. So where've you been last? New York City, I hear?" She asked me, while pointing to some ingredients she needed me to get.

I hopped down from the counter and went over to the cupboard she was pointing at. "Actually, I was in Japan for a few days after New York. JAXA needed some information I was only allowed to give in person."

Amy furrowed her brows. "What's a JAXA?" She asked, seeming completely calm before suddenly slamming the bowl down on the table and hunching over, making me flinch. It was like a switch was flicked in her, a switch that induced random bouts of pain—but I knew that it really was contractions.

I moved over to her quickly. "Amy? Amy, what do you need?"

She was panting now, not really seeming to acknowledge me, and screamed—"Rory!" so loud that it echoed around the house.

"Amy, breathe..." I tried to relax her, getting her to sit down.

"Rory! It's starting!" She called again, but then calmed down a few seconds later and grabbed the bowl of batter she was making, right as Rory burst in through the door, moving me out of the way and kneeling in front of her.

Rory was wide-eyed in front of her; panting from whatever running he had been doing, while Amy just continued to eat some batter off the spoon. "False alarm."

"What?"

"False alarm."

_"What?"_

"Well, I don't know what it feels like. I've never had a baby before," Amy reminded him matter-of-factly, putting the spoon to his mouth and feeding him some of the batter nonchalantly.

"Mmm!" Rory stood up, right as a familiar whooshing sound was heard just outside the small house.

"No," Amy stood up also. We shared a look, knowing what was coming.

"I know-- leaf blowers. Use a rake!" Rory exclaimed, still carelessly eating some batter, not thinking what Amy and I were.

I took the bowl from Amy and set it down on the table. "That's not a leaf blower, Rory. That's..."

The landing noise sounded, and the blue TARDIS box could be perfectly seen from the kitchen window. "I knew... I just knew..." Amy smiled. Rory ran out quickly. "Wait, the oven!" Amy panicked.

"I'll get it, you take longer to move now—just go." I opened the oven, pulling out some already-done cupcakes.

"Hey!" Amy fought back, but the smile on her face betrayed her voice, and she moved out the door.

After the cupcakes were set out, I followed Amy just a little behind, hearing that the Doctor had already seen her.

"You've swallowed a planet!" He exclaimed, carefully examining her belly.

"I'm pregnant." Amy giggled.

"You're huge!"

"Yeah, I'm pregnant!" Amy repeated, but the Doctor didn't really seem to be grasping the concept. He then noticed me.

"Nova!" He exclaimed, quickly pulling me into a hug, almost making me trip. He pulled back, "It's so hard to find you now, all these people, needing your help..." He grinned teasingly.

I laughed and shook my head. "I could say the same for you! But I've finally been called to Leadworth, for god knows what..."

He beamed at me, before furrowing his brows quickly, realizing that he missed something, looking back to Amy. "Are you pregnant?"

**888**

We were all walking down a village lane, which wasn't a big problem as no one else was really there. "Ah, Leadworth. Vibrant as ever." The Doctor remarked, and I couldn't tell if he was being sarcastic or not. Sure, there wasn't a lot of people, but the place was so green, and being around a lot of big cities recently—I had missed it.

"It's Upper Leadworth, actually. We've gone slightly upmarket." Rory informed us, proud of their small relocation, but it didn't seem to make much of a difference to the Doctor or me.

"Where is everyone?" The Doctor asked.

"This is busy." Amy looked around. The Doctor and I gave her looks of confusion. "Okay, it's quiet, but it's really.... restful, and healthy. Loads of people here live well into their nineties."

I smiled at her, trying not to laugh at that. Being in the quaint little town of Leadworth was a bit of a culture shock from all the other cities I've been working at recently. 

Amy and Rory were definitely the objects at rest.

"Well, don't let that get you down," The Doctor reminded her.

I looked around the village, and noticed some elderly people staring out a window—directly at me, the Doctor, and even a few at Amy and Rory. It was making me uncomfortable.

"It doesn't get me down." Amy promised him.

I stared right back at the elderly, and then remembered something...

Why was I stationed at Leadworth?

The Doctor sat between Amy and I on a small bench, leaving Rory standing. "I wanted to see how you were. I don't just abandon people when they leave the TARDIS. This Time Lord's for life. You don't get rid of the Doctor so easily."

Amy gave him a pointed look. "You came here because of Nova, didn't you?" She asked him, and then it clicked into place.

Amy and Rory were always at rest, the Doctor was always in motion—and I was the external force. The one that made them change from how they were before. I made the Doctor come to Leadworth and remain at rest, and since I brought the Doctor by coming here, in a way, Amy and Rory were now in motion.

"Yeah, a little. But look, what a result. Look at this...bench. What a nice bench. What will they think of next?" The Doctor admitted.

"Doctor, we're missing something important. Something's wrong." I told him.

He looked concerned. "What?"

"How did you know I would be here?"

"Well..." He began, making a face, obviously trying to come up with a clever reason, but there was nothing, just like I expected. "I don't know. Why did you get stationed here?"

I racked my brain too, just as I have been since I saw the old lady. "I don't know. Why are the birds so loud?"

I was the external force... but why?

"That's what we do around here. We relax, listen to the birds..." Rory explained, sitting crisscross on the floor now.

"Oh, blimey. My head's a bit, ooh..." The Doctor rubbed his forehead, and I looked at Amy and Rory, realizing that all of us were beginning to get the same feeling. The Doctor continued on about birdsong, but slowly stopped, and just like I expected, we all fell asleep.

**888**

And continuing, like I expected, we woke up in the TARDIS.

I realized I was siting in the captain's chair, and quickly stood up, looking around the TARDIS to notice Amy and Rory walking in, and the Doctor on the floor. "What? No, yes, sorry, what?" The Doctor stood up and saw us three giving him strange looks. "Oh, you're okay. Oh, thank God. I had a terrible nightmare about you three. That was scary. Don't ask; you don't want to know. You're safe now." The Doctor hugged Amy, and then me.

It took a long time for me to remember what was happening, probably because I was technically in a dream state, and it was difficult to remember a lot of real-life details when you were dreaming. But as soon as I woke up in the TARDIS, I remembered that this was the dream episode, and knew for a fact that none of us had really woken up.

"Oh, okay..." Amy trailed, confused.

"That's what counts. Blimey, never dropped off like that before. I'm getting on a bit, you see. Don't let the cool gear fool you. Now, what's wrong with the console?" The Doctor walked over to it and began poking around. "Red flashing lights... I bet they mean something."

"Um, Doctor, I also had a kind of dream... thing." Rory scrunched his face, as if he were confused at his own sentence.

"Yeah, so did I." Amy joined in.

"Me too," I fidgeted, not knowing if I should tell them what was happening.

"Not a nightmare, though, just... we were married." Rory smiled sheepishly.

"Yeah, in a little village." Amy remembered.

"I was there. You were pregnant." I tried.

The Doctor jumped up from the console, surprised, and walked over to us slowly. I gave him a wary look as Amy continued on. "Yes, I was huge! I was a boat."

The Doctor tugged on Rory's hoodie, looking for his ponytail, but it wasn't there. Rory didn't seem to notice, too busy piecing things together with Amy. "So you had the same dream, then? Exactly the same dream?"

"Are you calling me a boat?" Amy glared.

"And Doctor, you were visiting. Nova was staying over."

"Yeah, yeah, you two came to our cottage."

"How can we have the same dream? It doesn't make sense."

"And you had a nightmare about us. What happened to us in the nightmare?"

The Doctor held open Amy's jacket, as if checking she wasn't really pregnant, and gulped. "It was similar, in some aspects."

I turned to him with a scolding glare. "Doctor."

He grimaced at me apologetically. "Okay, it was exactly the same."

"You had the same dream?" Amy asked, though she seemed to already know the answer.

"Basically."

"You said it was a nightmare." Rory wondered.

The Doctor was fidgeting now, speaking faster. "Did I say nightmare? No, more of a really good...mare. Look, it doesn't matter. We all had some kind of psychic episode. We probably jumped a time track." The Doctor clapped his hands and moved back to the console. "Forget it! We're back to reality now."

"No we're not." I added quietly. Amy and Rory didn't seem to hear me, distracted by the birdsong starting to sound, but the Doctor looked to me sharply.

"Doctor, if we're back to reality how come I can still hear birds?" Amy asked, looking up, as if she would find the birds or wherever the noise came from up there.

Rory was looking up now too, speaking in a weary voice, as if he knew something was going wrong, and he didn't want to deal with it. "Yeah, the same birds. The same ones we heard in the..."

**888**

"...Dream." Rory finished his sentence, from his place sitting crisscross on the floor in Upper Leadworth.

I blinked open my eyes and stood up, noticing I fell asleep leaning on the Doctor's shoulder. I stumbled backward a little, looking at the three of them, still sitting where they were, wide-eyed. "We're back. In Leadworth."

"Oh. Sorry. Nodded off, stupid. God, I must be overdoing it..." Rory trailed off.

The Doctor immediately stood up after me, going to pick up a small pebble from the ground.

I cut Rory off. "No. You were both dreaming you were in the TARDIS, weren't you?"

"But we thought _this_ was the dream." Rory remembered.

Amy carefully stood now too, her hand on her swollen belly. "I think so. Why do dreams fade so quickly?"

Rory walked over to the Doctor, who had now thrown the pebble he was examining back on the ground. "Doctor, what is going on?"

"Is this because of you? Is this some Time Lord thing because you've shown up again?" Amy paused for a second, and then turned to me. "Wait, are you _experimenting_ on us again?" She shouted angrily.

"What? No!" I stood back defensively. In a way, it made sense. I felt that something like that happened before, I just couldn't remember exactly what it was, just like a dream.

The Doctor ignored our bickering, speaking in a very serious, low voice that caught our attention. "Listen to me. Trust nothing. From now on, trust nothing you see, hear or feel."

"But we're awake now." Rory stated firmly, truly believing it.

"Yeah, you thought you were awake on the TARDIS, too." The Doctor reminded him.

"But we're home." Amy looked around.

"I'm not!" I complained, not knowing how to prove my point. I moved away from them to look at the old people's home to see if the elderly were still looking at us through the window, and they were. I turned away from them. No matter how much I tried to stare back at them, they wouldn't look away, and they were secretly ancient aliens.

The Doctor shook his head, frustrated. "Yeah. You're home. You're also dreaming. Trouble is, Rory, Amy, Nova, which is which? Are we flashing forwards... or backwards? Hold on tight." The Doctor stepped between Rory and Amy, and moved next to me. "This is going be a tricky one."

**888**

I woke up again, sitting in the chair next to Amy, both of us almost falling off upon awakening. The Doctor was gripping a lever on the console. "This is bad. I don't like this." He kicked the console, and hurt his foot. "Argh! Never use force. You just embarrass yourself. Unless you're cross, in which case-- always use force."

My head cleared at that, thinking back on my external force theory I had for myself. I stood, and Amy did too. "Shall I run and get the manual?" She asked him.

The Doctor went downstairs to look under the console. "I threw it in a supernova." He replied back.

"You _threw_ it to Nova?" Rory asked, sounding somewhat angry at the prospect of the Doctor throwing something at me.

"No! In a _super-_ nova! In space!" The Doctor yelled to him angrily, looking up at him through the clear glass floor.

I walked downstairs to join the Doctor, and hopefully minimize the yelling. He was looking around and pulling at some wires, and I gently placed my hand on his arm, interrupting him. "Doctor, why did you throw it in a supernova?"

"Because... I disagreed with it." He admitted, and furrowed his eyebrows. "Don't do that. How do you do that?"

"Do what?"

"The soft face. The... the big eyes." He tried explaining, gesturing to my face as if I would understand. I gave him a confused look and he continued on. "That calm-me-down face."

"Ooh, so it works!" I smiled, joking. I wasn't really aware I made a face.

He pointed his finger at me. "Not a lot of people can do that." He went back upstairs and I followed behind him, still smiling to myself.

"Okay, but whatever's wrong with the TARDIS, is that what caused us to dream about the future?" Rory asked, as we came back upstairs.

"The future? We were not in the future." I stated firmly.

"Of course we were. We were in Leadworth." Amy figured.

"Upper Leadworth." Rory added, still proud of moving upmarket even when he wasn't in that dream.

"No. There is no way we could have been dreaming about the future." I argued, not knowing how I would explain it to them.

"Yeah, but we could still be in Upper Leadworth, dreaming of this. Don't you get it?" The Doctor looked to us, messing with some tools on the console.

"No, no, I mean it's literally, physically impossible that the other world could be real. At least for me it is." I fought back, hoping if I said enough words, they would eventually start to make sense, because I couldn't figure out how to explain this while keeping all my secrets.

"What do you mean?" Rory asked me.

I fidgeted. If I didn't tell them about my universe travelling, which I couldn't, I would have to tell them something that made sense anyway. I figured I would have to give up at least one secret, but it isn't as if they didn't already have a basic idea of it anyway, and the Doctor already knew about most of it, since I eventually told him. 

"My job. In Leadworth, I was working everywhere, travelling with NASA. There's no way I could do that. There's no way I could... _quit_ Area 51." I tried.

"What? So it can't be possible because _we_ have our dream lives and _you_ don't?" Amy asked me, angry, and stepping closer towards me.

"No, that's not what I meant, it's just..." I coiled back, too scattered how to explain the terms and conditions of working at Area 51 went. I didn't want Amy to be mad at me, because then it would mean something related to the first time I met her, when she was mad at me and I didn't understand why. If that time ever came, it might mean that I would leave soon. Even without that, I didn't want for her to be mad at me anyway.

"Then what did you mean, Nova?" Rory asked, getting all bothered on Amy's behalf, too.

I stumbled back. Having them both possibly mad at me was the worse feeling. "No, it's—"

"She's not _allowed_ to quit Area 51. The government _forces_ her to work there. If she tried to quit, they would kill her." The Doctor spoke for me, equally as angry, just in a lower voice, brewing a calm rage that could explode if someone crossed the line.

I was glad I had taken the time to explain 51 to him a little more at some point, or else I wouldn't have known what to say. I was surprised he spoke for me like that.

Amy's eyes were wide. "Sorry. I didn't know."

I shook my head. "It's okay."

Rory walked up to me now. "Wait, you mean they have you working there forever? There isn't one person who just... retired?"

"Well yeah, but, I'm at the bottom. I wouldn't be able to retire until I'm at least 70." I explained, slightly embarrassed to admit that I was really at the bottom of the hierarchy in most research teams, and not really paid much attention to by any higher-ups aside from Zodiac.

"But there's still a slight possibility." Rory argued, not wanting to let go of the idea that he was living his dream life, sometime, somewhere out there.

"No, okay, no, this is real. I'm definitely awake now." Amy reasoned.

"And you thought you were awake when you were all," The Doctor puffed his cheeks and held his arms open, as if showing an example. "Elephanty."

"Hey!" Amy pointed the wrench she was holding at him aggressively. "Pregnant!"

"And you could be giving birth right now. This could be the dream. I told you, trust nothing we see or hear or feel. Look around you. Examine everything. Look for all the details that don't ring true." The Doctor continued around the console.

"Okay, we're in a spaceship that's bigger on the inside than the outside." Rory began.

"With a bow-tie wearing alien, and another more normal one." Amy added.

I smiled at that and nodded at her. "Yeah, _what rings true_  doesn't really help."

"Valid point." The Doctor agreed, right when the machine whirred down. The lights went off, and everything was dark, save a little blue light around the console. It instantly became a little colder, and somehow sadder. It was an abrupt change from the lively glowing orange. He looked up. "It's dead. We're in a dead time machine."

The birdsong started again, and Rory went over to hold Amy in his arms. I turned around and held on to the console with my hands behind my back, not wanting to fall over when I fell asleep again. The Doctor didn't move, and appeared to be listening to the birdsong carefully. "Remember-- this is real, but when we wake up in the other place, remember how real this feels."

Amy had her arms tight around Rory. "It is real. I know it's real."

**888**

We woke up again in the great outdoors of Upper Leadworth, but this time I wasn't sitting down. I was standing, somewhat leaning against the Doctor, who had one arm around me and was already awake, trying to steady me up.

I turned away quickly to hide my blush, and saw Amy and Rory waking up sitting on a bench. "Okay. This is the real one, definitely this one." Amy rubbed her pregnant belly. "It's all solid." She slowly stood up.

"It felt solid in the TARDIS too. You can't spot a dream while you're having it." The Doctor waved his fingers in front of his face.

"Sometimes you can." I added.

Rory walked over to us. "You still don't believe this, Nova? You could get promoted at work. And, Doctor, what are you doing?"

"Looking for motion blur, pixilation. It could be a computer simulation. I don't think so, though." The Doctor explained to Rory, not looking at him, too busy staring at nothing in the air.

I made a small, frustrated noise, trying hard to figure out more ways to explain the impossibility of the situation without using my biggest argument of not even being from this universe and knowing the future, knowing that this was a dream, and the other was also a dream. It couldn't have changed... nothing that has happened so far has changed this much. My being here couldn't just make one of the worlds real now, they both had to be a trick.

I thought about it, but I wouldn't travel all the way to this universe just to work a different job, even if it was the one I always wanted. I thought of why I travelled over here anyway, and turned to Rory and Amy with another argument. 

"Look, maybe you guys would leave the TARDIS, settle down in Upper Leadworth and get married, have ten kids, whatever. But I'm _stuck_ at Area 51. Trust me, I am. And even if I did somehow get out, I'm still a Time Lord, the second-to-last one. Why would I leave the TARDIS?" I argued, maybe a little too passionate on the last two sentences, because Rory and Amy were silent, and the Doctor had stopped waving his fingers in front of his face and was paying his full attention to me.

An elderly lady walked by, interrupting the moment. "Hello, Doctor."

"Hi," The Doctor smiled, while Rory leaned down a little and said "Hello," at the same time.

I stared at the woman intently, wondering if she was already an alien too. As a scientist, I learned to consider all the possibilities... so I had to do the same here. I had to treat this world like it was real, which wasn't hard to do. Even with all my other knowledge, it really did feel real.

The woman paused and gave them a strange look, before walking on. The Doctor looked to Rory, amused. "You're a doctor?"

"Yeah. And unlike you, I've actually passed some exams," Rory defended.

The Doctor gave a sly smile. "A doctor, not a nurse. Just like you've always dreamed. How interesting." The Doctor walked on, and we followed.

"What is?" Rory asked.

"Your dream wife, your dream job, probably your dream baby. Maybe this is your dream." The Doctor explained to him, turning and stopping.

"It's Amy's dream too. Isn't it, Amy?" Rory asked nervously.

"Yes. Course it is, yeah." Amy added, equally as nervously. "Isn't it your dream job too, Nova?"

The only person I've ever spoken to about what I would do if I weren't in Area 51 was Dylan, and even then, we didn't really say much. It felt like forever since that conversation-- so much has changed since then. I just didn't have the space to dream big, and before 51, I still wasn't even sure what I wanted to do. I was just planning on getting basics in university. 

"I... don't really know," I responded quietly. It didn't seem like too bad of a job.

Without turning around, the Doctor pointed with his thumb over his shoulder—"What's that?"

"Old people's home," Amy answered.

When we all turned to look at it, we realized many of the people were shamelessly staring at us through the windows, just like I saw them before. "You said everyone here lives to their nineties. There's something here that doesn't make sense. Let's go and poke it with a stick." The Doctor ran off, and Rory and I followed.

Amy sighed, placing her hands on her back. "Ugh. Can we not do the running thing!"

**888**

In the old people's home, the seniors casually relaxed in chairs covered in quilts and blankets around the room. It looked cozy and cute, just like old people's homes were meant to be, but something about it still felt eerie. I hugged myself out of instinct.

"Oh, hello, Dr. Williams," A nurse said upon passing.

A woman in a chair looked up from her knitting. "Hello, Rory, love."

Amy and I paused behind Rory while the Doctor immediately began looking around. "Hello, Mrs. Poggit. How's your hip?" Rory acknowledged.

"A bit stiff," she answered honestly.

The Doctor looked up from whatever he was observing on a small coffee table. "Oh, easy, D-96 compound, plus..." The Doctor trailed off, noticing our confused and warning faces. "No, you don't have that yet, forget that."

"Who's your friend? A junior doctor?" Mrs. Poggit asked Rory, motioning to the Doctor, who grinned at the ironic question.

"...Yes," Rory answered slowly, staring at the Doctor, a little undecided as to how to really answer the question.

"Can I borrow you? You're the size of my grandson." The lady asked the Doctor nicely.

He awkwardly kneeled in front of her, and she fit the sweater she was knitting over his head. "Um, Slightly keen to move on. Freak psychic schism to sort out." The Doctor grabbed her chair and leaned in close to her, so close that she had to lean back in her own chair. The room went silent. "You're incredibly old, aren't you?"

I wanted to say something about how rude it was to say that, and even made a few steps toward the Doctor so that I was somewhat next to him—but my head started hurting. I looked around the room and noticed that all the other residents were staring obviously and very directly at the Doctor, or at me, again, just like they did in the windows. 

My mind was scrambling to say something, do something, figure something out—but the birdsong was getting louder, and falling to the ground, I slept.

 


	21. Amy's Choice (pt 2)

"Okay, I hate this, Doctor. Stop it, because this is definitely real, it's definitely this one. I keep saying that, don't I?" Amy hugged herself, pacing.

The Doctor moved to the second level of the cold, dead TARDIS. "It's freezing," I shivered, hugging myself also.

"Yeah, it's bloody cold!" Rory agreed in frustration.

"The heating's off." The Doctor shouted from the upper level.

"The heating's off?" Rory questioned in disbelief. It was hard to imagine that something as complex as the TARDIS would suffer from something as simple as the heating being off.

"Yeah. Put on a jumper. That's what I always do."

Rory shrugged. "Yes, sorry about Mrs. Poggit. She's so lovely though."

I worried at how adamant Rory was about the other world being real, even though I knew this one felt as real to him as it did to the rest of us. The Doctor knew better. "Oh, I wouldn't believe her nice old lady act if I were you."

Amy leaned against the console with her arms crossed. "What do you mean, _act_?"

"Didn't she creep you out?" I asked her, but she only gave me a strange look.

"Everything's off, sensors, core power. We're drifting. The scanner's down so we can't even see out. We could be anywhere," The Doctor explained, coming back to the console. "Someone, something, is overriding my controls!"

Almost instantly as he said that, a hologram appeared behind him, on the steps. The man was short, dressed comically similar to the Doctor. I glared, a bit unconsciously. I knew exactly who he was.

"Well, that took a while." The man smiled eerily, walking down to the console. As if he had to—he was a hologram, after all. "Honestly, I'd heard such good things-- last of the Time Lords, the Oncoming Storm. Him in the bow tie..." He approached me and leaned in so closely to my face I had to lean back, even though I knew he couldn't touch me anyway. "Though ' _last_ ' isn't quite accurate anymore, is it..."

The Doctor's voice was low. "How did you get into my TARDIS? What are you?"

The hologram walked right past him and around the console as if he owned the place. "What shall we call me? Well, if you're the Time Lord, let's call me the Dream Lord."

"Nice look," The Doctor offered, in a voice that sounded like he wasn't really giving much of a compliment at all.

The Dream Lord looked down at his attire. "This? No, I'm not convinced. Bow ties?"

I glared at the Dream Lord, walking toward him angrily, and purposefully—walking through him, proving he was a hologram. I pivoted on my heel after I did and crossed my arms.

"Interesting." The Doctor commented, the corners of his mouth turning up slightly.

The Dream lord faintly chuckled. "I'd love to be impressed, but Dream Lord-- it's in the name, isn't it? Spooky, not quite there." He disappeared, and reappeared behind the Doctor, Amy, and Rory. "And yet, very much here."

"I'll do the talking, thank you. Amy, want to take a guess at what that is?" The Doctor asked her, as if the Dream Lord wasn't there. Which he technically wasn't, but the Dream Lord's hologram was smiling while Amy made her deductions anyway.

"Um. Dream Lord. He creates dreams." She stated the obvious, being put on the spot.

"Dreams, delusions, cheap tricks," the Doctor tested, looking directly at the Dream Lord.

"And what about the gooseberry here, does he get a guess?" The Dream Lord taunted.

"Listen, mate, if anyone's the gooseberry around here, it's the Doctor." Rory defended weakly.

"There's a delusion I'm not responsible for," The Dream Lord retorted.

"No, he is. Isn't he, Amy?" Rory asked casually, looking for validation.

The Dream Lord grinned. "Oh, Amy, have to sort your men out. Choose, even."

"Why are you so obsessed with the men in Amy's life?" I asked defensively, walking in front of them and facing the Dream Lord.

Now he actually laughed. "Oh dear, I could ask you the same thing."

Heat rising to my cheeks both in anger and embarrassment, I tried to defend myself. "What! I don't—"

"It doesn't matter!" Amy thankfully interrupted. "I _have_ chosen. Of course I've chosen." While still glaring daggers at the Dream Lord, Amy smacked Rory's chest. "It's you, stupid."

Rory was relieved. "Oh, good. Thanks."

The Dream Lord disappeared again and reappeared behind us, leaving me at the back again. "You can't fool me. I've seen your dreams, some of them twice, Amy. Blimey, I'd blush if I had a blood supply... or a real face."

The Doctor approached him and spoke swiftly, fed up with the whole performance. "Where did you pick up this cheap cabaret act?"

"Me? Oh, you're on shaky ground."

"Am I?"

"If you had any more tawdry quirks you could open up a Tawdry Quirk Shop. The madcap vehicle, the cockamamie hair, the clothes designed by a first-year fashion student... I'm surprised you haven't got a little purple space dog just to ram home what an intergalactic wag you are." None of us had moved, and although the Doctor didn't seem to be offended at all, I knew better, and we were all worried about what he was hiding. "Where was I?"

Rory stuttered, not understanding the rhetorical question. "Um, you were—"

The Dream Lord disappeared yet again, and reappeared on the stairs above us. "I know where I was!"

This time, I took the opportunity to move closer to the Doctor, and tried to see what else he was feeling besides anger towards the Dream Lord—but I couldn't. His jaw was tensed and his eyes were dark. When I reached for his hand gently, he didn't turn to me, didn't take his glare off the Dream Lord as he began explaining—but he held my hand in his.

It was kind of a habit for me now since the first time in Starship UK. I would see it in his face that he wasn't okay, that he felt sad or angry or something else I couldn't quite put my finger on. And if I didn't know what to say or couldn't say anything—I would slowly and subtly trace my fingers lightly under his palms, until he moved to grab my hand. It was a small gesture, but it was something—and he seemed to readily accept it every time. It was a small reminder of what I had told him the first time—that he isn't alone anymore.

Though this time, I wasn't just grabbing his hand to calm him down. I was grabbing his hand to steady me up. I knew what was coming—I knew we would fall asleep again, but I wanted to figure out what the Dream Lord knew about me. He seemed to be a part of the Doctor, but the way he spoke proved that he knew other things the Doctor wouldn't.

"So, here's your challenge. Two worlds. Here in the time machine, and there in the village that time forgot. One is real, the other's fake. And just to make it more interesting, you're going to face in both worlds a deadly danger. But only one of the dangers is real. Tweet, tweet. Time to sleep."

The birds sounded again, and I opened my eyes wide and gripped the Doctor's hand tight—who had begun falling before I did. I was the last one standing—but I couldn't force myself awake, and couldn't keep my vision on the Dream Lord as I slowly dropped to the ground.

**888**

I woke up with a jolt back in the lounge of the old people's home. I immediately stood up as the Dream Lord strode in the room in a suit with x-rays in hand. "Oh, this is bad. This is very, very bad. Look at this X-ray. Your brain is completely see-through! But then, I've always been able to see through you, Doctor."

It didn't take long for Amy's gaze to snap from a dazed one to an angry and concentrated one. "Always? What do you mean, always?" She asked, piecing together the connection the Dream Lord might have with the Doctor.

"Can you see through the rest of us?" I added. The Doctor sat in the chair, not quite defeated but not quite fighting—while the Dream Lord completely avoided our subject.

"Now then, the prognosis is this. If you die in the dream you wake up in reality; Healthy recovery in next to no time. Ask me what happens if you die in reality."

"What happens?" Rory contributed.

"You die, stupid. That's why it's called reality." The Dream Lord mocked.

"Don't call Rory stupid," I defended, with more bite in my voice than I intended.

"Ooh, getting a bit protective, aren't we?" he smiled.

Amy interrupted before I could think of anything to say. "Have you met the Doctor before? Do you know him?" She turned to the Doctor, who was still slumped back in what used to be Mrs. Poggit's chair. "Doctor, does he?"

"Oh, you girls are getting all defensive over the opposite men. Now, don't get jealous. He's been around, our boy. Never mind that. You've got a world to choose." He approached the Doctor, still sat in the chair. "One reality was always too much for you, Doctor." He turned back around to face me. "Yet... not enough for you." I breathed in sharply. He knew, and everyone turned to look at me with curiosity. I tried my best to seem just as confused as they were, though I didn't really have to try that hard.

"Take two and call me in the morning... Nova, take three?" he smiled, and disappeared.

We were silent for a few moments, everyone staring at me, until Rory spoke up. "Okay, I don't like him," he admitted to me. I smiled at the fact that it took Rory the entire conversation for him to make up his mind on that.

"What did he mean, Nova?" Amy asked me.

I shook my head, honestly trying to piece it together. "I don't get it..." I thought out loud. If the Dream Lord knew I travelled to a different universe, wouldn't he also know that I knew all of this was a trick? Wouldn't he try to change something, or force me to really wake up?

I hoped no one noticed when my face grew pale, coming to a realization. What if he did change something? What if he _did_ know what I knew and really decided to make one place real?

Amy crossed her arms and turned to the Doctor, demanding answers. "Who is he?"

He still didn't move from his chair. "I don't know. It's a big universe."

"Why is he doing this?"

"Maybe because he has no physical form. That gets you down after a while, so he's taking it out on folk like us who can touch and eat and feel." He finally stood up and removed the sweater Mrs. Poggit had forced on him earlier, the tight neckline causing his hair to fluff up. He ironically appeared as if he had just woken up.

I guess Rory figured he wasn't going to get any answers from the Doctor, and turned to me instead, "What does he mean, deadly danger? Nothing deadly has happened here. A bit of natural wastage, obviously."

"Well maybe it has something to do with the fact that everyone's disappeared?" I offered to him, just as the Doctor looked around the room and noticed the same thing.

"They've all gone.... They've all, gone." He observed slowly, before quickly dashing out the door.

**888**

Just outside the home, the elderly didn't seem to be anywhere, but a group of school children were being ushered towards some ruins.

"Why would they leave?" Rory wondered.

"And what did you mean about Mrs. Poggit's act?" Amy added, not missing the old detail. They made the perfect team together, really. Rory focused on the big pictures, and Amy focused on the smaller details.

"One of my _tawdry quirks_ –" the Doctor said, a bit exaggerated, and I raised my eyebrows at him. I knew he was offended by that earlier, but at least he seemed to be shrugging it off now. "--Sniffing out things that aren't what they seem. So come on, let's think. The mechanics of this split we're stuck in... Time asleep matches time in our dream world, unlike in conventional dreams."

"While when travelling between universes, there's almost always a time difference," I added, glad that my jumping back and forth with the locket was useful. Time always went by faster over here, so maybe that clue could help them scratch that theory.

"Yes, exactly." The Doctor pointed at me.

"And we're dreaming the same dream at the same time," Rory added.

The Doctor began pacing. "Yes, sort of communal trance, very rare, very complicated. I'm sure there's a dream giveaway. But my mind isn't working because this village is SO DULL!" The Doctor shouted, looking up at the sky, not noticing the expressions on Rory and Amy's faces. "I'm slowing down, like you two have."

"Ow," Amy added suddenly, holding her pregnant belly. "Really, ow!" She added, sounding more panicked, before screaming so loud I was sure the children heard. "It's coming!"

The Doctor's eyes widened and he turned to Rory. "Help her, you're a doctor."

"You're a doctor!" He quickly retorted, slowly growing more scattered.

"It's okay, we're doctors," The Doctor squatted and awkwardly gestured his hands at Amy, as if the baby would fall out and he would catch it. "What do we do?" he panicked.

I stood there smiling, knowing what Amy was up to as she sighed and quickly regained her composure. "Okay, it's not coming."

The Doctor stood again. "What?"

"This is my life now and it just turned you white as a sheet. So don't you call it dull again, _ever_. Okay?" Amy demanded.

"Sorry." The Doctor admitted quietly.

"Yeah," Amy stalked off, Rory following.

The Doctor stood with a dumbfounded expression for a moment, and I couldn't help but laugh. "And you didn't think to ask the other woman what to do, did you?"

**888**

"Now, we all know there's an elephant in the room," The Doctor began, aimlessly swinging back and forth on a children's swing set.

Amy was sitting on the swing next to him, still crossing her arms in anger. "I have to be this size, I'm having a baby."

"No, no. The hormones seem real, but no. Is nobody going to mention Rory's ponytail?" The Doctor pointed at him, getting Amy to break her grudge and slowly smile at him. "You hold him down, I'll cut it off," he offered, and Amy chuckled.

"This from the man in the bow tie?" Rory huffed.

"Bow ties are cool," the Doctor piped, this time making me smile, even though he may not have completely understood why.

He stood from the swings to watch Mrs. Poggit staring at the school children in the distance. "I don't know about you, but I wouldn't hire Mrs. Poggit as a babysitter. What's she doing? What does she want?"

Before he could answer the question, the birdsong began again. Amy sighed. "Oh no, here we go."

**888**

In the TARDIS, Amy and Rory walked over to the Doctor and I, who were already at the console. "It's really cold. Have you got any warm clothing?" Amy asked, rubbing her arms.

"What does it matter if we're cold? _We have to know what she is up to_!" The Doctor shouted.

"Sorry, sorry." He immediately recovered, as if he was snapping out of his previous mood. We stared at him blankly, all of us understanding he was just frustrated. He rubbed his hands over his face and addressed Amy in a much calmer and slightly apologetic voice. "There should be some stuff down there, have a look," he gestured, and Amy followed. Rory followed too, but not before he defiantly zipped up his hoodie, glaring at him for shouting at her.

I moved closer to the Doctor now that they were gone, and rested a comforting hand on his knee. "You'll figure it out," I assured him. Even if I hadn't seen this before and knew exactly what would happen... I still had faith in him anyway. It's why I made reckless decisions before that may have changed time. I knew that even if I messed up and truly changed the course of time, he could still fix it in the end.

He looked at me carefully—not afraid, but curious. "And what if I don't?"

"Then I will," I affirmed. For some reason, I was expecting a laugh, or for him to take him as a joke, or any other reaction. But instead, he just... smiled at me. I didn't want to think about what it meant, not right now.

Realizing the compromising position, I quickly spun on my heel. I sat at the edge of the TARDIS floor and jumped to the level underneath the console. I knew what might happen, that maybe none of this was real, but I had to help, even if it was just something to make him feel better. "Now, there has to be something down here that will work..."

**888**

The Doctor and I stood around the console, already working on it when Amy and Rory arrived. "Ah, Rory, wind." The Doctor handed him a strange, sort of homemade looking device.

Rory looked at it confused, so I moved his hand to where the handle was, and he nodded his thanks at me, while I took the attached wire and handed it to Amy. "Can you plug this in to the monitor?"

She obliged, raising her eyebrows at me as she did.

I shrugged, and went back to pressing the buttons I knew of on the console. "Well I mean, it's just a generator." I offered. "I know how stuff works."

Amy tapped the monitor, which wasn't turning on. "It's not enough."

"Rory, wind!" The Doctor instructed.

Rory begrudgingly began winding. "Why is the Dream Lord picking on you? Why us?"

Rory stopped winding when the monitor came to life, revealing a starscape. 

"Where are we?" Amy asked carefully.

"We're in trouble," the Doctor admitted.

"What... is that," Rory pointed, worried at the large light blue star that appeared on the monitor.

"A star. A cold star." The Doctor ran over to the doors and opened, them revealing a blinding light. "That's why we're freezing. It's not a malfunction. We're drifting towards a cold sun! That's our danger for this version of reality." He forced the doors closed and returning to look at the large monitor on the wall.

Amy stood close by Rory, hugging herself and shivering. "This must be the dream. There is no such thing as a cold star. Stars burn."

"So is this one. It's just burning cold," the Doctor attempted to explain.

"Is that possible?" Rory asked.

"I can't know everything. Why does everybody expect me to, always?" The Doctor complained, plopping down on the console chair dejectedly.

"It is, though." I tried. "There've been 6 Y-Dwarfs recorded by NASA with temperatures cooler than the human body, so... it's not completely impossible. They're from the brown dwarf family."

I knew I had a reasonable answer, but I also knew that Rory desperately wanted the other world to be real. He turned to the Doctor anyway. "Okay, but this is something you haven't seen before, this one's a lot colder. So does that mean this is the dream?"

"I don't know, but there it is, and I'd say we've got about," the Doctor checked his watch, "14 minutes until we crash into it. But that's not a problem." He stood up.

"Because you know how to get us out of this?" Rory hoped.

The Doctor, who was putting on a stethoscope, looked to me, wanting me to be the one to break the news instead. "Because by then we would have already frozen to death," I explained, as gently as possible.

"Then what are we gonna do?" Amy worried.

The Doctor began applying the stethoscope to the console. "Stay calm. Don't get sucked in to it, because this just might be the battle we have to lose."

"Oh, this is so you, isn't it?" Rory grumbled.

The Doctor turned to him. "What?"

"A weird new star, 14 minutes left to live and only one man to save the day? I just wanted a nice village and a family!"

I looked to Amy, but she had her head in her hands, and before I could say anything, the Dream Lord appeared behind the Doctor. "Oh, dear, Doctor. Dissent in the ranks. There was an old doctor from Gallifrey, Who ended up throwing his life away, He let down his friends and..." the birdsong began again. "Oh, no, we've run out of time. Don't spend too long there, or you'll catch your death here."

**888**

The Doctor rushed up the steps to the ruins where the children where playing before. "Where have the children gone?" He asked, as he walked up and began using his sonic to scan around the place.

"Don't know. Play time's probably over," Rory responded, before turning to Amy. "You see, this is the real one. I just feel it. Don't you feel it?"

"I feel it both places," she admitted.

I was beginning to get annoyed with how adamant Rory was about this place being real, and drowned them out as I slowly walked towards the Doctor while looking all around. There were piles of cloth and dirt everywhere... until it clicked. 

I remembered what the aliens did to kill people. This wasn't dirt; this was the children's ash.

The Doctor let some of the dust fall through his fingers. "Playtime is definitely over."

"Oh, my god." Amy realized.

"What happened to them?" Rory asked.

We turned around and looked back down into the village, where the elderly were slowly moving down a path. "I think they did," the Doctor answered.

Amy was confused. "They're just old people."

"No. They're _very_ old people," the Doctor rushed down the stairs, all of us following. "Sorry, Rory, I don't think you're what's been keeping them alive."

The elderly were lined up facing us now, almost in an awkward, feeble battle stance. We all walked toward them, but the Doctor was ahead, moving angrily, until the Dream Lord appeared again, walking out in front of him.

"Hello, peasants. What's this, attack of the old people? Oh, that's ridiculous. This has got to be the dream, hasn't it?" He looked to me as I stopped beside the Doctor. How was I going to figure out what he knew? What he planned? 

"What do you think, Nova? Let's all push a button and wake up in the TARDIS," he teased. 

Push a button... as if he knew... but then why would he leave me here if I had the answer, unless I didn't? 

"You first!" The Dream Lord continued, focusing back on the Doctor.

"Leave her alone!" The Doctor grumbled, glowering at him.

The Dream Lord grinned. "Do that again! I love it when he does that. Tall dark hero, ' _leave her alone_ '." He turned to Amy this time. "Don't you agree, Amy?"

"Just leave her!" Rory glowered at the Dream Lord also.

The Dream Lord squinted at him. "Yes, you're not quite so impressive. But I know where your heart lies, don't I, Amy Pond?"

"Shut up! Just shut up and leave me alone," Amy demanded.

"But listen, you're in there. Loves a redhead, the Doctor!" He turned tome again, "Has he told you about Elizabeth the First? Well, she thought she was the first..."

"Drop it!" The Doctor interrupted, "Drop all of it. I know who you are."

The Dream Lord shook his head. "Course you don't."

"Course I do. No idea how you can be here, but there's only one person in the universe who hates me as much as you do."

The Dream Lord smiled, and I only grew worried. If the Doctor figured out the Dream Lord was a part of him, did he hate himself? "Never mind me!" The Dream Lord quipped. "Maybe you should worry about _them_."

As soon as we turned our heads towards the elderly, who were now advancing towards us, the Dream Lord had disappeared.

"Hi," Rory greeted immediately, no real sign of nervousness that should be in his voice. He was still so focused on this world being the real one.

The Doctor tried interrupting Rory as we walked towards them. "Hello. We were wondering where you went. To get reinforcements! Are you all right? You look a bit tense."

"Hello, Mr. Nainby!" Rory greeted an old man.

"Rory, seriously," I warned.

He didn't stop talking, didn't move away, only tried to justify himself to me. "Mr. Nainby ran the sweet shop. He used to slip me the odd free toffee." Even when the man lifted him by the collar, he still tried. "Did I not say thank you?" The man threw Rory back into the mud. "How did he do that?!" He shouted, standing up.

"I suspect he's not himself. Don't get comfortable here. You may have to run. Fast." The Doctor scrambled, looking towards Amy, trying to convince her to move now.

Amy sighed, looking down at her pregnant belly. "Oh, can't we just talk to them?"

Just as she attempted to reason, the elderly all opened their mouths at the same time, revealing a reptile looking eye slowly moving out of them. "There is an eye in her mouth!"

The Doctor scanned them with his sonic. "There's a whole creature inside her. Inside all of them. They've been there for years, living and waiting."

"That is disgusting. They're not going to be peeping out of anywhere else are they?" Rory cringed.

"Don't insult them!" I huffed. I didn't have to explain why, because Mrs. Poggit proved my point for me, leaning forward and shooting a green mist towards us.

Rory began tugging at Amy, pulling her away to safety, while the Doctor put himself in front of us. "Run!" he turned back to them, before addressing the elderly aliens again, knowing better than to attempt to tell me to leave also. "Okay, Leave them. Talk to me. You are Eknodines, a proud, ancient race-- you're better than this. Why are you hiding away here? Why aren't you at home?"

Mrs. Poggit was the body that was moving, but her voice was low and robotic, representing the creature inside her. "We were driven from our planet—"

"By upstart neighbors." The Doctor finished for her, slowly catching on, while the Mr. Nainby alien continued.

"So we've..."

"...Been living here inside the bodies of old humans for...years. No wonder they live so long, you're keeping them alive."

"We were humbled and destroyed. Now we will do the same to others." Mrs. Poggit announced.

The Doctor made a pained face at how strange the whole situation was. "Okay, makes sense, I suppose. Credible enough, could be real."

A man with a bicycle was walking up beside us, "Morning," he chirped.

I pulled him back by the arm on instinct. "No!" I shouted, right as Mrs. Poggit made a strange screeching noise and opened her mouth to reveal the eye. The mist that shot from her mouth got the bicycle, instead of the man and I, and turned the bicycle to dust.

The man looked to me in shock and confusion, not being able to speak. "Go!" I instructed him, and he uttered a thank you before running back.

The Doctor watched him run, and turned back to the elderly. "You need to leave this planet," he demanded, only to be met with a loud, harsh screech from the creature inside her.

**888**

As the Doctor and I entered a butcher shop, I wondered if the fact that I knew both places were a dream, or at least hoped I knew, had something to do with the fact that I was better at resisting falling asleep than the Doctor was. The aliens, albeit slowly, had been on our tail the entire way over here, and the bird song had been fading in and out. But somehow, we made it through the door, and I wasted no time, knowing exactly where we'd have to go to keep ourselves from the elderly aliens.

"Oh, I love a good butcher's, don't you? We've got to use these places or they'll shut down. But you're probably a vegetarian, you big flop-haired wuss," The Dream Lord teased, leaning over the counter, dressed as a butcher.

The Doctor was headed for a different door, but I pulled him over towards the freezer. I knew we were both too drowsy to try and pick the lock right now. "Shut. Up!" I shouted to the Dream Lord. The Doctor didn't seem to protest when I opened the freezer door.

"Oh dear, quite grouchy. Maybe you need a little sleep." The Dream Lord teased. The bird song grew louder, and I fell to the floor. "Oh, wait a moment. If you fall asleep here, several dozen angry pensioners will destroy you with their horrible eye things."

I stood up, my ears beginning to ring, but with every last bit of energy I had, I rushed into the freezer, the Doctor following me, and used his sonic to lock the door as we both fell asleep.

 


	22. Amy's Choice (pt 3)

We all woke up on the floor of the TARDIS where we left off, sitting up. Amy clutched the blanket she had. "Ah, it's colder."

The Doctor frantically buttoned his jacket. "The four of us have to agree, now, which is the dream."

"It's this, here." Rory stated without missing a beat.

Amy shrugged. "He could be right. The science is all wrong here, burning ice?"

The Doctor shook his head. "No, no, no ice can burn, sofas can read, it's a big universe. We have to agree which battle to lose. All of us, now!"

"Okay, which do you think is real?" Amy asked.

"This one."

"Me too," I added.

"No, the other one!" Rory fought back.

The Doctor pointed to Rory. "Yeah, but are we disagreeing, or competing?"

"Competing over what?" Amy asked, lost.

The Doctor and Rory stared at her, and she groaned as she stood up again, realizing their point. I stood up with her.

The Doctor checked his watch. "Nine minutes till impact," he announced as he stood up.

"What temperature is it?" Amy asked, throwing off the blanket and going to look for something else.

"Outside? Brrr," The Doctor shivered. "How many noughts have you got? Inside? I don't know but I can't feel my feet and... other parts."

"I think all my parts are basically fine." Rory stated coldly.

I glared at them. They were competing over everything, which was just what the Dream Lord wanted. "Seriously?"

Rory went over to the console and took the wall phone from it. "Can't we call for help?"

The Doctor took the phone from him. "Yeah, the universe is really small-- bound to be someone nearby!" The Doctor tapped Rory on the head with the phone before hanging it back up.

"Stop it!" I stood between them. "This, you two fighting, is exactly what the Dream Lord wants. And it doesn't even matter anyway, because it's not like you can control which is real."

The boys looked at me apologetically, when Amy threw ponchos at us. "Put these on, all of you." She threw one at the Doctor and I, and slipped the other one over Rory's head herself.

Rory looked down at himself. "Oh, a poncho—the biggest crime against fashion since lederhosen."

Amy put hers on. "Here we go! Our boys... our poncho boys." She grabbed my hand and moved over so we stood between them. "If we're going to die, let's die looking like a Peruvian folk band."

She looked on fiercely at the cold star getting closer to us in the monitor, and I was the only one who let out a small chuckle at her comment.

"We're not going to die," Rory stated, even though he didn't sound like he believed himself. He just had to keep trying.

"No, we're not," the Doctor checked his watch. "But our time's running out. If we fall asleep here, we're in trouble." The Doctor began pacing. "If we could divide up, then we'd have an active presence in each world, but the Dream Lord is switching us between the worlds. Why, why, what's the logic?"

The Dream Lord appeared in a poncho beside the Doctor, and paced with him. "Good idea, veggie, let's divide you three up, so I can have a little chat with our lovely girls. Maybe I'll keep them, and you can have Pointy Nose to yourself for all eternity, should you manage to clamber aboard some sort of reality."

"Can you hear that?" Rory asked us, who had begun to drop off.

"What? No." Amy responded.

I shook my head. "I can't either."

The Doctor put his hands on our shoulders. "Amy, Nova, don't be scared, we'll be back."

"I'm not scared," I responded passionately. I refused to be scared, and hoped that was enough. The Doctor had already fallen to the floor beside Rory, and I grabbed Amy's hand, making her look at me. "We're _not_ scared."

**888**

When Rory woke up on the small staircase, Amy was sleeping, leaning against him. He realized he had no choice but to try and move her, with an alien already trying to crash through the window. He grabbed her by the arms and began dragging her up. "Sorry!" He apologized to her sleeping form.

He eventually dragged her into a room on upstairs and locked the door—the yellow room that would soon belong to their future child. Or at least, he hoped it would. He stared at the crib and gulped.

**888**

The Doctor woke in the freezer again, and found Nova sleeping against him. As he carefully laid her on the floor, he couldn't help but think she looked peaceful when she was sleeping, however weird it was.

He took off his tweed jacket and draped it over her. "I'll come back for you," he whispered to her. "If this is real... I won't leave you. But it's safer here, right now." He kissed her on the forehead before opening the door, and running out.

**888**

We had been alone in the TARDIS for quite some time, and ice had begun forming all throughout the floor and railings, and even on the console. Despite the fact, I wanted to try to do something. I still didn't completely know what the Dream Lord knew—still didn't know if this world was real or not. I wiped some ice particles out of a port on the console I was trying to connect a wire to. Moving around kept me warm, anyway.

Amy didn't want to say anything. She was sitting on the stairs by herself, until the Dream Lord showed up next to her. "Poor Amy. He always leaves you, doesn't he? Alone in the dark, never apologizes."

I whipped around at the sound of his voice, seeing him sitting next to her. "And you always leave him," he smiled, looking at me.

"I don't leave him," I responded. So the Dream Lord knew I left.

"And he doesn't have to apologize," Amy explained, standing up and moving next to me.

"That's good, because he never will. And now he's left you with me. Spooky old, not-to-be-trusted me." The Dream lord reappeared on the chair, leaning back in a bathrobe, showing a great deal of chest hair. "Anything cold happen."

"Amy, don't talk to him, I can get what we need. I can fix this." I told her. I could get anything from 51 and bring it back here to fix the TARDIS.

"You won't be able to," The Dream Lord called in a singsong voice.

I took out my locket from behind my layers of clothing and pressed the button, but it didn't work. I knew what that meant.

This had to be a dream.

"Oh," the Dream Lord gasped playfully. "Your funny little button not working?"

I acted like I was scared, like he had all the control. But I knew what it meant—nothing had changed.

"I'll let you go back. But you'll stay there, and never see your friends here again," he told me.

"Never see my friends again?" I asked. The button didn't work, but I was still connected to it. It was time to test a theory I've had since the first day I met the Doctor and Amy—since Amy trapped my locket in the car door. 

Hurting my locket necklace had to hurt me for a reason.

I knew there was only one way to escape the Dream World.

The Dream Lord was a version of the Doctor. Maybe the Doctor had guessed that I switched universes... but he didn't know that I knew everything. He didn't know that, in a way, I still saw him over there.

"Technically, I would see my friends again. Where do you get your information from?" I asked, ripping off the locket from my neck with all the strength I had, throwing it to the floor, and crushing the gem under my foot. As soon as I did, I felt all my energy drain instantly, and fell to the ground.

**888**

Amy woke up with a jolt, realizing she was in a different room, the baby's room, and was lying with her head on Rory's lap. She sat up abruptly. "How did I get up here?"

"I carried you. I'm afraid you may experience some bruising..." Rory responded.

"Where's the Doctor? Where's Nova?" Amy asked frantically. She saw Nova drop before her eyes, and seconds later ended up here.

"I don't know. I want to do something for you." Rory turned around, and unzipped a bag, grabbing a pair of scissors from it. He reached back and cut off his ponytail.

Amy gasped. "I was starting to like it."

There was a squeaking sound, and they looked to the window in alarm only to find that the Doctor was climbing in.

"It's all right! I had to stop off at the butcher's." The Doctor fell to the floor. "Where's Nova?"

Amy's eyes went wide. "She's not with you?"

Doctor shook his head. "No. I went back to look for her, but she wasn't there."

Amy gulped. Thankfully Rory interrupted, because she didn't know what to say. She didn't know what it meant. "What are we going to do?"

"I don't know. I thought the freezing TARDIS was real, but now I'm not so sure," the Doctor admitted.

Amy gasped. "I think the baby's starting."

"Honestly?" Rory asked, only slightly nervous.

"Would I make it up at a time like this?!"

"Well, you do have a history of..." Rory began, but changed his mind when Amy glared at him. "Being very lovely," he finished, as Amy cried out. "Why are they so desperate to kill us?"

The Doctor stood. "They're scared. Fear generates savagery."

A piece of garden statuary was thrown through the window. Rory went to look, only to be met with the face of Mrs. Poggit, who shot green mist at him. Rory fell back with a groan, and Amy moved to comfort him.

The Doctor knocked Mrs. Poggit from the roof with a lamp, and turned to see Amy and Rory.

"Rory!" Amy cried.

"No! I'm not ready," Rory admitted, but he had already begun to dissolve.

"Stay," Amy demanded, sobbing.

The Doctor wiped his eyes too. It was already too late.

"Look after our baby," Rory whispered, completely dissolving away.

"No. No! Come back," Amy cried, in denial. The Doctor was speechless, and was only able to mouth Amy's name. She turned to him. "Save him! You save everyone. You always do. It's what you do."

The Doctor shook his head. "Not always. I'm sorry."

Amy's grief quickly turned to anger. "Then _what_ is the point of you?!"

Amy touched the pile of dust that used to be Rory, and stood up. The Doctor wanted to help, to comfort her, but he couldn't bring himself to touch her. He didn't know what the point of him was.

"This is the dream. Definitely, this one... now, if we die here, we wake up, yeah?" She asked the Doctor.

He nodded. "Unless we just die."

"Either way, this is my only chance of seeing him again. This is the dream," Amy stated, not wanting to think about how Nova died in the other world. She was a Time Lord... maybe the Doctor could fix her. After all, she only ripped her necklace and crushed the crystal inside.

"How do you know?"

"Because if this is real life, I don't want it. _I don't want it._ "

**888**

The Doctor and Amy left the house, but the elderly did nothing.

"Why aren't they attacking?" Amy asked.

"Either because this is just a dream, or because they know what we're about to do." He figured. Nova was still nowhere to be found, and he knew that if she was still alive, she had to have found them by now. She had to have...

They walked to the bus and Amy stopped, facing the Doctor. "Be very sure. This could be the real world," he reminded her, one last time.

"It can't be. Rory isn't here. I didn't know. I didn't, I didn't, I honestly didn't, till right now. I just want him." She admitted.

The Doctor felt selfish for it, but she wasn't thinking of Rory when he gave her the keys. He was thinking that... he didn't want to be alone again. "Okay," he held her hand tightly. "Okay."

Amy walked around to the driver's seat and started the car. When the Doctor walked to the passenger side, the Dream Lord was there, looking at him. He didn't even give him a mean glare, only got into the vehicle without a word.

"I love Rory, and I never told him, but now he's gone." Amy declared.

The Doctor only stared at her. He couldn't think about Rory. He couldn't think about Amy, or the logic, or anything else besides Nova. He looked out the window at the Dream Lord, and her name was the only thing repeating itself in his head. It was the only thing he heard. And for the first time, he let himself believe it wasn't just because she was the only other Time Lord left. 

It was just because of her.

He couldn't think logically right now. All he could do was hope Amy was right, because Amy had to get back to Rory as the Doctor had to get back to Nova, and that was it.

Nova.

And the car crashed.

**888**

Every inch of the TARDIS was covered in ice, so much that it looked like it had snowed everywhere. So much that bits of ice covered everyone's faces and hands. The Doctor, Amy, and Rory couldn't see anything beyond what was in front of them. They couldn't see who was missing.

The Dream Lord appeared. "So...you chose this world. Well done. You got it right. And with only seconds left. Fair's fair. Let's warm you up." The Dream Lord restored the power by moving things on the console. "I hope you've enjoyed your little fictions. It all came out of your imagination, so I'll leave you to ponder on that. I have been defeated. I shall withdraw. Farewell." He disappeared.

The Doctor slowly got up to his feet, and started to work the controls, struggling through the frost.

Amy and Rory kneeled, facing each other. "Something happened. I..." Rory panted. "What happened to me? I..." Amy didn't explain, and only leaned forward slowly, hugging him. "Oh. Oh, right. This is good. I am liking this. Was it something I said?" Amy released him from the hug, and just looked at him. She didn't think she would be able to do that again. "Can you tell me what it was so I can use it in emergencies? And maybe birthdays..."

They were interrupted by the sound of the TARDIS booming. "What are we doing now?" Amy asked.

The Doctor was still working away at the console. "Me? I'm going to blow up the TARDIS."

"What?" Rory asked in disbelief.

"Where's Nova?" he asked back.

"She's probably just off somewhere, I mean it's not like..." Rory guessed, but the Doctor noticed Amy's blank stare.

"Amy, what happened?" the Doctor asked her seriously.

Amy didn't really want to tell him what had happened... that she had... done that to herself. She didn't even want to think about it. So she gave him an abridged version of the truth. "The necklace she had, it ripped off and then the gem inside it was crushed, and... it killed her."

"She's connected to it. You hurt the necklace, and you hurt her." He explained, but his expression slightly brightened. He knew he would still get back to her. He had to. "Notice how helpful the Dream Lord was? Okay, there was misinformation, red herrings, malice, and I could have done without the limerick, but he was always very keen to make us choose between dream and reality." The Doctor laughed slightly, but not one that sounded genuine, not one that sounded like he really found something hilarious.

It was one that sounded mad.

Amy panicked. "What are you doing?"

"Doctor! The Dream Lord conceded. This isn't the dream!" Rory reasoned.

"YES, IT IS!" He yelled, still somewhat laughing as he moved a lever, and the TARDIS shook, glowing red.

"Stop him!" Amy told Rory.

"Star burning cold. Do me a favor! The Dream Lord has no power over the real world. He was offering us a choice between two dreams." The Doctor explained.

"How do you know that?" Amy demanded.

"Because I knew who he is." He discarded his thoughts of the Dream Lord when he pulled the lever.

And the TARDIS exploded.

**888**

I walked down from a different staircase than the one Amy and Rory were walking down. The Doctor was leaning against the console, looking at something in his hand. "Any questions?" he asked.

"What happened?" I asked, walking up next to the Doctor and looking closely at the glittering specks in his hand. "And what's that?"

He looked over at me, and I could feel him staring at me, so I continued staring at his outstretched palm. "Well... we all died." He gulped, and was silent for a moment before going off on an explanative spiel again. "A speck of psychic pollen from the candle meadows of Karass don Slava. Must have been hanging around for ages. Fell in the time rotor, heated up and induced a dream state for all of us," He walked over to the open door, and gently blew the pollen into space.

"So that was the Dream Lord then, those little specks?" Rory tried to understand.

"No, no. No. Sorry, wasn't it obvious?" The Doctor came back to the console. "The Dream Lord was me. Psychic pollen, it's a mind parasite. It feeds on everything dark in you. Gives it a voice, turns it against you. I'm 907. It had a lot to go on."

"But why didn't it feed on us, too?" Amy asked.

"Darkness in you three? It would've starved to death in an instant. I choose my friends with great care. Otherwise I'm stuck with my own company, and you know how that works out." He smiled slightly.

"You don't believe the things he said about you, do you?" I worried.

He didn't answer my question, and only went over to Amy and spun her around by the shoulders to face Rory. "Amy, right now a question is about to occur to Rory. And seeing as the answer is about to change his life, I think you should give him your full attention," He pushed her towards Rory, and walked to the far side of the console, taking my hand and dragging me along with him, and standing to observe.

Rory looked confused for only a moment. "Yeah. Actually, yeah."

"There it is." The Doctor smiled, giving me a knowing look, as if he wanted me to be proud for him having gotten it right.

"Cause what I don't get is, you blew up the TARDIS, that stopped that dream, but what stopped the Leadworth dream?" He asked Amy.

"You blew up the TARDIS?!" I turned to the Doctor accusingly.

"Sort of..." He gave me a sheepish look, continuing on as Rory and Amy reconciled. "What happened to you?"

I felt around my neck and reached for my locket and looked at the crystal, which was still there, and still intact. "Well... I died." I stated carefully, not wanting to tell him that I killed myself, because I didn't think telling him I figured it out would be believable.

When we turned our focus back to Amy and Rory, they had just finished kissing. "So...." The Doctor applauded. "Well, then, where now? Or should I just pop down to the swimming pool for a few lengths?"

"I don't know. Anywhere is good for me. I'm happy anywhere. It's up to Amy this time. Amy's choice." Rory smiled, still holding Amy.

The Doctor clapped his hands and began working the controls.

I held my locket in my palm again and played around with it in my hands. Since the whole thing we went through was just a Dream, only a night should have passed. "I think I'm just... going to go now," I stepped back.

"No!" Amy shouted suddenly.

"No?" I questioned. I've left before, and didn't understand why she wouldn't want me to. Time went by slower over here, so I was never gone for long.

She ran over and took my hand, and began pulling me to the hallway of the TARDIS. "I need to talk to you," she stated, and then led me into a room and closed the door.

The room happened to be a coat closet, but I didn't pay much attention to it when Amy grabbed me by the shoulders. "Why did you kill yourself?" She asked bluntly.

"I... just..." I stuttered, not expecting that question, and not knowing what to say without explaining everything.

"Don't say that you knew. I know you didn't know..." she tried, taking her hands off my shoulders and stepping back, noticing my reluctance. "You can tell me anything..."

"Anything?" I asked, getting anxious. Prisoner Zero's parasite in my brain prevented me from telling the Doctor anything, but would it prevent me from telling Amy?

Amy nodded. I weighed my options. She might not even believe me, and I didn't know what I could say to convince her. Or maybe she _would_ believe me... Maybe I just had to try.

I didn't come out with a warning, didn't think of a way to say it—I just had to get it out before I over-analyzed it. It would be good to tell someone here, and River hardly counted considering I still didn't know if I could trust her, and she was never really around. I knew Amy's character. And she had to know that I did.

"I know the future. Sort of." I blurted. I couldn't take it back now.

"What?" She huffed. "Okay, wait, what do you mean sort of?"

She didn't give me a completely crazy look, and didn't seem to completely not believe me. I grabbed my locket again. "This is going to sound... completely ridiculous, but it's true. This locket here—when I press it, it takes me to another universe. The universe that I thought I was born in until I found out I was a Time Lady. In that universe I'm a scientist at Area 51, whatever, but I'm also... a fan of something?"

Amy raised her eyebrows, her mind probably going down a different path from mine. "A fan of something?"

"Think about it. The Dream Lord asked me about different worlds, that's what he meant. Look, my hair glows, okay! That doesn't even make sense. So the different universe thing is a lot more possible." I explained quickly.

"Okay, I believe you on that. But what did you mean you're a fan of something? How can you see the future?" She asked, slightly pacing in front of me, taking it all in much better than I thought she would.

"I don't see the future. I just... know it. The weird part is... you know the theory of multiple universes? It states that every possibility exists in a universe somewhere. And in my universe, this whole thing is... a TV show." I cringed when I said that. It sounded much better in my head. "But I don't know everything, because since I'm here, the time lines can change. Some things that have happened weren't supposed to. So I don't know _everything_ everything." I knew I was talking too fast now, it was a nervous habit, but Amy still gave me her full attention.

She was about to speak again, but I cut her off. "And I couldn't tell you because first of all, it might mess up the time lines even further and a lot of bad things could happen if that messes up, and second of all... there's a parasite in my brain that prevents me from telling the Doctor. There's some sort of plan to get him, and if I told him, or if I said the plan out loud to anyone, I would get a killer headache, or stop breathing, or anything. I don't know. I don't control it. I could die."

Amy gulped, now staring at me with wide eyes. "Why haven't you tried to stop the bad things?" she asked.

"I _have_ tried. And I have stopped some bad things. But sometimes, if I stop one bad thing, other ones might be made worse just as a chain reaction, because it's not supposed to happen." I explained. "Butterfly effect."

She was concentrated on her memories now, and I could see she was piecing everything together in her head. "When you stopped breathing on the Starship..."

"I was trying to tell him. I was trying to tell him I knew, but the thing in my brain, it's Prisoner Zero or something. It didn't let me. But I guess I found a loophole... I guess I can tell you." I figured.

"Well then I can tell the Doctor." Amy offered, but right when she said that, a sharp pain went through my head.

"No, you can't. I mean, my head hurts now, but it could also alter the time lines and... I'm lying to him and I don't want to and..." I couldn't think straight with the pain that went through my head, as if I was being punished for thinking of a way to tell him. "I hate it," I shut my eyes in pain and held my head in my hands. "This thing, my brain would know, I don't want to be selfish and not tell him but I physically cannot even get those words out to you, I can't tell you the plan!"

She walked up to me and held my arms away from my face. Her look was partially concerned, but mostly determined. "Try."

"The Silence," I uttered, before my head started hurting again, and I choked. "I cannot control this, I don't even know why it let me tell you this in the first place—If I tried anymore, it would just..."

"Stop! Stop," Amy shook her head, standing away from me. "I'm sorry."

"Do you believe me?" I asked.

She nodded.

"I'm trying everything I can. I don't know everything it won't let me do. But you can't tell him, Amy. You can't tell him _anything_. It'll be okay. Not just for him, but for everyone." I explained. Everything would work out in the end anyway.

"I won't." She promised. I had no choice other than to believe her.

I thought she was mad at me. I feared the day she would be mad at me, and I guess she saw the fear on my face, because she pulled me in, and hugged me tight,

"I don't want to lie," my voice muffled, my face still buried in her neck. I couldn't tell if the fact that I wasn't saying anything made me a bad person or not.

She rubbed my back. "I know."

 


	23. The Hungry Earth (pt 1) / Tests (pt 2)

It's not like I've never been on a date before. Hell, it's not even like I've never had a boyfriend before. However, I couldn't remember the last time I went on a date because it had literally been years, and I definitely have never been on a date in Area 51. So as I sat there in the theater chair of the planetarium next to Dylan, you couldn't blame me for having absolutely no idea how I felt.

Part of me was excited. Part of me was happy. Part of me was nervous. Part of me was worried. Part of me felt like this was right. Part of me felt like this was wrong. But mostly, all of me was completely distracted and over-thinking.

"You alright?" Dylan asked me, taking my hand. I tried to wipe the thoughts of the last person whose hand I held out of my mind. Of course, Dylan could see right through me.

"Yeah, just... I don't know, this is different," I tried.

If I didn't know Dylan so well, I might not have noticed the slight flinch in his face, which would be the normal-person equivalent of their face falling. However, Dylan was a field worker. He was trained not to show an emotion if he didn't want to. "Good different? Or..."

"Just different." I stated, truthfully not knowing the answer myself.

Dylan smirked. "Look, this isn't over yet," he reached into his pocket and took out a remote-looking object, pressing a set of buttons.

When he did, the planets and stars we were staring at on the ceiling slowly... fell. The 2D projected images slowly faded down into 3D holographic ones, and I stood up as the stars fell around me, morphing through the space around us like clouds, or a video in slow motion. I smiled in awe. "This is Holographic Intel. This software isn't authorized for another year! How did you—"?

"I have my ways," Dylan stood with me, grabbing both my hands. "Which may or may not involve a short blonde girl named Meredith..."

I giggled at that, and he reached out one of my hands he was holding towards one of the holographic planet. When we touched it, the planet spun around, and froze in place, revealing a box of information about it along with it that had its galactic coordinates and said, "touch to find out more."

"Go on," Dylan said to me, leaning close enough to whisper, " _Find out more._ "

I raised an eyebrow at him suspiciously, biting my lip to hide my smile, and letting go of his hand to touch the box. I didn't even bother reading any further than the planet's name: Scarlette Rivera.

"Dylan!" I breathed in shock. "You named an _entire planet_ after me."

"That I did," he laughed at my surprise, and I looked at him when he stopped, noticing he wasn't bothering to hide the seriousness that grew over his face.

"Dylan? Are you—"?

"Scarlette, there's something I have to tell you." He grabbed my other hand again, holding them both up, and stepping closer to me so his forehead rested on mine. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath before stepping back again. "You don't have to say anything. Actually, I don't think I want you to. It's just... I care about you. A lot. Probably more than you think I do."

I gulped, and nervously moved a hand out of his grip to tuck my hair behind my ear. For the first time in my life, I had the premonition that Dylan thought of me much more than I thought of him.

"I just wanted you to know that," he added, still holding up my other hand that I hadn't taken away to move my hair. I didn't know what to say back. I _couldn't_ say anything back, literally. My mind wasn't in the right place. It was wandering to a million other subjects that had nothing to do with the present moment, and nothing to do with Dylan.

But just for a few moments, I let it focus on him. I thought about how grateful I was for him, and how sorry I was that I wasn't sure about the exact amount I cared for him—but I knew that I did.

I did care for him.

I got on my tiptoes and moved closer to his face, unsure for a few moments, hearing both our breathing patterns slowly matching themselves.

I made up my mind, and kissed his cheek. "Thank you," I whispered, before turning and walking away.

**888**

Although he may seem like it on the surface, Mo was not an average man, technically speaking. While your average man may be a married father of one and a blue collar worker—your average man would not be an amazing father to a dyslexic son, and work at a mine that just drilled further than anyone's ever drilled into the Earth. Your average man may have read a book to his son and walked to work in the morning—however, your average man _never_ would have experienced what happened next.

Nearly the instant Mo pulled out his book to read, the ground beneath him began shaking harshly. When all the security cameras in front of him seemed to erase themselves, he grabbed his flashlight and began walking towards the drill center despite the fact that he was shaking with fear. This was his job, after all.

Smoke was rising from the hole. "That is mad," Mo whispered to himself. When he kneeled down to investigate, his flashlight fell through. He reached his hand in to get it; only something was pulling him under, sinking him beneath the earth, silencing his screams for help.

**888**

Rory closed the door of the TARDIS behind him, the Doctor and Amy ahead of him somewhere at the big drill. Although the Doctor's irresponsibility was annoying at times, Rory truly didn't mind the fact that they were at gloomy 2020 Wales rather than at Rio instead—as long as he was with Amy. After all, he came back to the TARDIS to leave her engagement ring there, so she wouldn't lose it.

As soon as Rory stepped back out of it, however, a seemingly friendly yet unfamiliar voice greeted him. "Well, that was quick."

"It was?" Rory asked, not knowing what was going on, as per usual. He turned around to see a rather short, average-looking middle-aged lady looking up at him expectedly.

"It's great that you came," the lady told Rory.

"Bit retro. What is it, portable crime lab?" A little boy asked Rory, walking around the TARDIS and smiling. Rory noticed his hair was dark, unlike the woman's reddish-brown, and his eyelashes were long. Despite the fact, he guessed he was the son of the lady.

"Oh, uh, sort of," Rory tried. The boy wasn't exactly wrong.

"Ambrose Northover," the woman shook Rory's hand. "I was the one who called. I run the meals on wheels for the whole valley. This is my son Elliot," the woman nodded towards the boy, who couldn't have been older than 13.

"Where's your uniform?" The boy wondered.

"Don't be cheeky, Elliott. He's plainclothes. CID, is it? Anyway, its over here," Ambrose motioned for Rory to follow behind her.

"Um..." They had already begun walking far from Rory, and he didn't see any other option. "Okay."

**888**

"Hello." The Doctor greeted the woman in the mine—brown skin, black hair, and quite short.

"Who are you? What are you doing here?" The woman asked immediately. They didn't normally get visitors. "And what are you wearing?" She motioned to Amy.

"I dressed for Rio," Amy grumbled, freezing in her shorts.

The Doctor held up his psychic paper, coming up with a random excuse and not caring about how whimsical it sounded. "Ministry of Drills, Earth and Science. New Ministry, quite big, just merged. It's lot of responsibility on our shoulders. Don't like to talk about it. What are you doing?"

"None of your business!" The woman chided, though somewhat disbelievingly and still moving tools around, not making much of an effort to get him out.

The Doctor examined a monitor showing readings, as if he owned the place, as per usual. "Where are you getting these readings from?"

"Under the drill," the woman crouched down by a hole in the ground.

"The drill's up and running again." A man commented nonchalantly, before noticing extra people in the room. "What's going on? Who are these people?"

Amy was leaned up against a piece of machinery, not caring to hide her annoyance. "Amy, the Doctor. We're not staying, are we, Doctor?"

The Doctor ignored Amy, not thinking she would like the answer anyway, and picked up a handful of soil from the ground. "Why's there a big patch of earth in the middle of your floor?"

"We don't know. It just appeared overnight." The woman answered.

"Good. Right. You all need to get out of here very fast." The Doctor stood up and went over to their computer systems, typing away.

"Why?" The woman asked.

"What's your name?"

"Nasreen Chaudhry."

"Look at the screens, Nasreen. Look at your readings. It's moving."

"Hey, that's specialized equipment! Get away from it." The man demanded, also walking up behind the Doctor at the screens, no one in the room noticing Amy crouching down by the hole in the floor.

"What is?" Nasreen asked, sensing the Doctor knew more than they did, and not letting it scare her.

"Doctor, this steam, is that a good thing?" Amy asked, observing the hole closely.

"Shouldn't think so. It's shifting when it shouldn't be shifting," The Doctor sounded perplexed himself.

"What shouldn't?" Nasreen asked again, louder this time.

As if on cue, the ground began to rumble. "The ground, the soil, the earth, moving. But how? Why?" The Doctor zoomed back to the computer equipment.

"Earthquake?" Amy guessed over the rumbling noises.

"Doubt it, because it's only happening under this room!" The Doctor answered, trying to figure it out in his mind.

The ground crashed again, and more holes appeared on the floor, everyone flinching back from where they were standing as not to fall in.

"It knows we're here. It's attacking. The ground is attacking us." The Doctor stated matter-of-factly, though slightly dumbfounded.

"No, no, no, no that's not possible," Nasreen shook her head.

The Doctor fidgeted for a moment. "Under the circumstances I'd suggest..." He didn't see any other way out. "Run!"

Everyone did as he said to the best of their ability, but the man got his leg stuck in a hole in the ground. The Doctor and Nasreen turned back to him, as Amy stood beside him, weighing her options in her mind.

"Tony!" Nasreen cried.

"Stay back, Amy! Stay away from the earth!" The Doctor tried, though part of him already knew what Amy was going to do.

She jumped over the hole, and began trying to help Tony up. Though right when she told him "It's okay," the ground beneath her crumbled, and her legs sank into the earth. "It's pulling me down!"

The Doctor ran over as quickly as he could. "Amy!"

"Doctor, help me! Something's got me! Doctor, the ground's got my legs!" Amy called, reaching for the Doctor.

"I've got you!" The Doctor shouted, grabbing Amy's hand and laying on the ground, trying to pull her out.

As if things could not get any worse, a shimmer of light appeared before them.

**888**

Although I recognized there were strange tingling effects and headaches upon jumping between universes I would feel, the sensation I felt now was nothing as I had ever felt before. My head still felt muffled for a moment, but it also felt as though someone was pulling on my legs.

And then I realized it was because someone _was_ pulling on my legs. Or rather, some _thing_.

Everything was rumbling and crashing around me, and it took me a moment to register the fact that now someone was pulling on my arm, and screaming my name. "Nova! This is the worst time!"

"It's not _my_ fault!" I defended, my head still hurting yet managing to hold on tight to the Doctor's hand, as Amy beside me did the same thing with his other hand. We were both trapped in a sinkhole, and our chances of getting out of it seemed very slim. Of course, I just _had_ to materialize in the middle of a sinkhole! "Amy, look at me."

While still gripping the Doctor's hand for dear life, Amy turned her head towards me. "I'll get us out of this, okay? We _will_ get out of this," I promised.

"You're talking like we're going to sink under!" Amy panicked.

"That's because we probably are!" Although I knew a way out, I gave myself room to panic, also. It wasn't every day you transport universes only to find yourself trapped in an inescapable deadly sinkhole.

"Nova, no! I'm not letting you go, are you insane?" The Doctor shouted.

"Yes! We'll be fine, Doctor, I promise!" I tried letting go of his hand, knowing it was for the best, but the Doctor still held on tight.

"No! Stop it! Both of you, stop struggling, it will make things worse!" The Doctor explained. Amy tried to calm herself down. "Your drill—shut it down. Go! Now!" The Doctor shouted to the people behind him, who ran out of the room upon his orders.

"I'm not struggling. Doctor, this isn't going to work. You can't pull us out; you can't hold on, you need to think of something else. You need to _focus_!" I shouted back, knowing this would all go a lot faster if he started thinking now.

"Stop that! I'm not going to let you go," The Doctor promised.

"I can't hold on, it's too much," I tried explaining, calmer this time, accepting what was going to happen.

Amy gulped beside me. "Doctor, it's pulling me down. Something's pulling me."

"Amy, grab my other hand," I asked her, and she nodded at me with tears in her eyes, grabbing my hand that wasn't holding the Doctor's. "We will be _fine_ , you hear me?"

"No, no! Concentrate. Don't you give up, either of you." The Doctor begged.

"I'm not giving up! Doctor, you need to think for me, okay?" I reasoned, trying my best to assuage the Doctor's fears.

Amy, on the other hand, truly thought she was going to die and was not helping my cause. "Tell Rory," Amy's voice broke, with tears in her eyes. She didn't get to finish her sentence as both of us began sinking under the earth. I could hear the Doctor's screams of "No!" as we were pulled down.

**888**

"How can something be coming up when there's only the Earth's crust down there?" Tony asked, running along with the Doctor and Nasreen, carrying the big, bulky, brief-case-like computer systems across an open field.

"You saw the readings!" The Doctor reminded them, not exactly in the mood to explain how something could be drilling up from underneath the earth as he did before.

"Who are you, anyway? How can you know all this?" Nasreen asked, pushing a cart along, but not caring much for the answer anymore when streaks of red lightning flashed across the sky, making flaming-whoosh noises. "Woah, did you see that?"

"No, no, no!" The Doctor bent down to find a slingshot and a rock on the ground, and shot it at the sky. Just as he expected, the rock bounced against a force in the sky, causing the same red-lightning blast to burst. The Doctor pulled his sonic out and whirred it at the atmosphere, revealing a perfect red-dome shape across the piece of land they have been roaming around. "Energy signal originating from under the Earth. We're trapped."

"Doctor, something weird is going on here, the graves are eating people," Rory approached the Doctor, with Ambrose and Elliot following behind him.

"Not now, Rory!" The Doctor called, continuing his sonicing, everyone looking to the sky in disbelief. "Energy barricade, invisible to the naked eye. We can't get out and no one from the outside world can get in."

"What? Okay, what about the TARDIS?" Rory tried.

"Uh, no. Those energy patterns would play havoc with the circuits. With a bit of time, maybe, but we've only got nine and a half minutes." The Doctor explained, still squinting towards the sky with his screwdriver.

"Nine and a half minutes to what?" Rory asked, looking down at his watch.

"We're trapped, and something's burrowing towards the surface." Nasreen complained, still in partial disbelief.

Rory looked around, noticing something missing. "Where's Amy?"

The Doctor looked to him for a moment, before turning back to grab the equipment and looked to Nasreen. "Get everyone inside the church. Rory, I'll get her back," The Doctor tried to pass quickly, but he knew it wouldn't work.

"What do you mean, get her back? Where's she gone?" Rory asked, a look of anger already crossing his face.

The Doctor turned back. "She was taken, and so was Nova. Into the earth."

" _How_? Why didn't you stop it?"

The Doctor put the equipment down and walked up to Rory. "I tried. I promise, I tried."

"Well you should have tried harder!" Rory shouted.

"I'll find Amy. I'll keep all of you safe. I promise. Nova is with her." The Doctor said, but Rory didn't wipe the glare off his face. The Doctor didn't blame him for it, but he needed help. "Come on, please. I need you alongside me."

Rory sighed, still glaring.

**888**

The Doctor was examining the inside of Ambrose's Meals on Wheels van. He had a plan, and it involved a lot of sensors, and every piece of technological equipment he could find.

He was _thinking_.

"Oi! What're you doing?" Ambrose asked, coming up behind him.

The Doctor didn't stop rummaging. "Resources. Every little helps. Meals on wheels. What've you got here, then? Warmer in the front, refrigerator in the back." The Doctor walked over to see the back of the van without noticing what Ambrose was placing in the front seat.

"Bit chilly for a hideout, mind." Ambrose commented.

"What are those?" The Doctor asked, standing at the side of the van with his hands behind his back, having an assumption in mind.

"Like you say, every little helps." Ambrose shrugged.

"No, no weapons. It's not the way I do things."

"You said we're supposed to be defending ourselves!" Ambrose argued.

"Oh, Ambrose, you're better than this. I'm asking nicely." The Doctor smiled, but there was something darker in his tone. "Put them away."

The Doctor turned away and walked back into the church, while Ambrose only stared at the assortment of weapons in the van.

**888**

Elliot ran up to the Doctor at the monitors with his colorful, detailed map he had been instructed to create.

The Doctor grinned widely, taking the map from him. "Look at that! Perfect! Dyslexia never stopped Da Vinci or Einstein. It's not stopping you."

The boy smiled before looking over at the monitor. "I don't understand what you're going to do."

The Doctor smiled, still tapping at the screen. "Two phase plan. First, the sensors and cameras will tell us when something arrives. Second, if something does arrive, I use this to send a sonic pulse through that network of devices. A pulse, which would temporarily incapacitate most things in the universe."

The boy smiled again. "Knock 'em out. Cool."

The Doctor walked around to some other monitors, so he was now technically facing Elliot, with only two computer screens in the way. He could see him through the gap between them. "Lovely place to grow up 'round here."

"Suppose," Elliot shrugged. "I want to live in a city one day. Soon as I'm old enough, I'll be off."

"I was the same where I grew up." The Doctor nodded nostalgically.

"Did you get away?" Elliot asked curiously.

"Yeah," the Doctor acknowledged quietly, still looking at the screen in front of him.

"Do you ever miss it?"

This made the Doctor pause for a moment, and look back at the boy. He couldn't deny that ever since Nova had shown up, he'd been thinking about home a lot more than usual. "So much."

"Is it monsters coming?" The boy asked. The Doctor stepped around to him. "Have you met monsters before?"

"Yeah."

"You scared of them?"

"No, they're scared of me."

"Will you really get my dad back?"

"No question," the Doctor smiled.

Elliot looked down and nodded. Even the young boy knew not to get his hopes up too much. "I left my headphones at home," he announced, walking away.

**888**

The fumes hurt.

That was the first thing my mind registered.

The second thing, was that the reason it was hurting was because of my Time Lord biology. The creatures down here most likely thought I was human.

I knew Amy would make it out of here safe. I knew that the only way _I_ could make it out safely, was if I left this place. I reached up and pressed my locket diamond, not even being able to open my eyes.

**888**

"How are you doing?" The Doctor asked Rory, who was staring at the sky outside, distracted from setting up a sensor.

"It's getting darker," he noticed, staring up as black splotches of night appeared in the sky like watercolor. "How can it be getting dark so quickly?"

The Doctor looked up at the sky, also, the whole dome around them going black. "Shutting out light from within the barricade. Trying to isolate us in the dark. Which means—" The ground rumbled roughly beneath them. "It's here."

 


	24. The Hungry Earth (part 2) / Tests (part 3)

I arrived back at Area 51 from a closet I had escaped from, and normally would have just pressed the button again to get back to the Doctor and help get Amy back. But for some reason, there was a lot of commotion going on outside, and I wasn't going to leave without finding out what it was.

I stepped out of the closet slowly, and walked out of the long, bleak, garage-looking corridor to see people running around frantically, forklifts being moved around, and certain illegal substances being suspended in the air. I looked around for someone I recognized, and the only person I saw was Sally, my dad's girlfriend.

"Sally, what's going on?" I asked, tapping her on her shoulder.

She turned around and gave me an apologetic look, clipboard in hand. You knew something was up when a clipboard was being held. "Oh Scarlette, you're supposed to be on your lunch break right now, we gave you extra time..."

"Why? What's happening?" I asked again, not liking the sound of this.

"We're moving your artifact." Sally stated coolly and carefully, giving me a look that was probably intended to calm me down, but wasn't helping.

"Which artifact? The orb?" I worried.

"Yes. We're moving it to France." She nodded, her lips forming into a thin line of pity.

Everyone knew that the France division was where artifacts went to die. They were basically just kept in storage over there, and routinely checked up on. Except the Area 51 version of storage was more like iron walls, glass cases with volt protection, and routine check-ups to making sure nothing exploded.

My eyes went wide. "What? No! You can't do that I-I just got it! I only performed _one_ test on it!" I tried reasoning with her. Although she wasn't as high in positions as Zodiac was, she was in charge of the artifact removal and transportation unit.

"I'm sorry, honey. I know it meant a lot to you, but it did something to you that was unexplainable and nothing else—and no one wants any part in something non-profitable, and even more so, something... nonsensical." She winced, as if it hurt her to call my artifact nonsensical.

"No, you don't understand—" I tried quickly to think of a use for the orb, but I really didn't want anyone touching it. 

My Area 51 self wanted it for scientific purposes, because only one test was ran, and the directors were either too afraid or too lazy to see what else it could do. My personal self wanted it for validation purposes; to know the thing I found on my own wasn't useless. But my Time Lord self wanted it the most, because it was the thing that activated my locket, and brought me to the Doctor. 

It _had_ to mean something, and I wasn't going to let it go.

"I'm sorry, you know I can't argue with the directors once they make a decision. No one can." She explained, and I knew she was right. The directors had control over everything, and the main reason no one could reason with them—was because they were completely anonymous. No one knew who they were.

"What if we take it to court?" I tried.

"We can't take something to court for at least a month. Another director was revealed two weeks ago," Sally reminded me. Area 51 had its own court, but a director was revealed and demoted to a position lower than Zodiac's at every trial. Because of this, only two could be held a month with the exception of emergencies. No one was going to think my orb was an emergency, and I couldn't explain why it was. 

"I'm sorry, really," Sally apologized again.

"It's fine," I said, sighing and walking away. 

It was absolutely _not_ fine.

As soon as I spotted Dylan across the room, I ran over to him. "Dylan! Do you know what they're doing?"

Dylan seemed surprised to see me. A little too surprised. "Scarlette—you're not supposed to be here," he stated the obvious.

"Yeah, everyone keeps saying that. Did they make you keep me distracted?" I asked, not wanting to think the date and everything he said to me was a lie.

"What? No! Scarlette, that was real. That has nothing to do with this," he assured me, gesturing between us.

"Are you sure?" I asked, still not persuaded.

"Scarlette, I'm serious." Dylan said, quieter this time.

"Then why did you know about this and not me? It's going to _France_ , Dylan. Artifact's Graveyard." I reminded him.

Dylan sighed, scratching the back of his head. "Okay, I got a director's order to keep you occupied. But that doesn't mean—"

I huffed in disbelief, crossing my arms and spinning around on my heel, stomping away. However, I only got a few paces in before he roughly grabbed my arm and spun me back around.

"Scarlette, I _really do_ care about you." Dylan promised, staring deep into my eyes.

I swallowed hard. I wanted to believe he was telling the truth. "Then prove it."

"Anything," he breathed.

"Stop the orb shipment. Please. Just for a few days—I know you can." I begged. Dylan was good at his job, and people liked him. Sure, I had some points of influence and my fair share of experience in persuading people, but the higher-ups in my field really weren't the types to be bothered, especially by the girl who has a personal connection to this artifact, got in the program too early so is set to be ahead of them, and literally never shuts up.

Dylan sighed, going to scratch the back of his head again. "Scarlette, I—"

I didn't hear the rest of what he said, because a throbbing headache and a harsh ringing in my ears overtook me. I tried not to make it to obvious, but the pain was splitting. I squint my eyes shut and put a hand up to my head. I felt a pair of hands, one on my back, and one on the arm I was holding up to my head. "Scarlette? What's wrong?"

"I just—" I tried, but the pain wasn't letting me concentrate. Thankfully, Dylan stayed quiet for a few moments, rubbing my back until the pain subsided and I felt like I could breathe again.

When I looked back up at Dylan, his face was worried, yet dark. "Scarlette, what was that?"

I shook my head. "Um, side effects. I still get them sometimes." Technically, I wasn't lying. It was a side effect from the orb, but it was more specifically a lagged response to the pain I usually get from travelling with my locket. I almost forgot about the pain I felt every time I switched universes when I got to the closet.

Dylan sighed again. "I'll do it, if you promise you'll go home and get some rest. You've been working non-stop since it happened and you shouldn't be."

I gave him a crooked smile, and threw my arms around his neck, hugging him tightly. "Thank you! I won't be long."

Dylan shook his head as he pulled away. "I know."

**888**

"See if we can get a fix!" The Doctor shouted, running into the church and slamming the door behind him, followed by Ambrose and Rory. The ground began to shake again, and things were rumbling and crashing all around him, but he was able to focus on the systems in front of him.

The lights exploded, shutting off the Doctor's work on the monitor.

"No power," Tony pointed out.

"It's deliberate," The Doctor knew, checking around at the systems.

Rory turned a flashlight on. "What do we do now?"

"Nothing, we've got nothing!" The Doctor shouted. "They sent an energy surge to wreck our systems." The Doctor began pacing around, trying to think of another idea. To him, every moment he was thinking was one step closer to getting back to Amy and Nova, and the fact that Nova had very specifically told him to _think_ both motivated him into doing so and drove him crazy. He was jittery.

"Is everyone okay? Is anyone hurt?" Rory asked immediately. Everyone declared they were fine, just as another rumble struck, shaking everything and causing technological pitters to resound through the air. "Doctor... what was that?"

"It's like the holes at the drill station," Tony figured, looking up as if the answer were in the ceiling.

But the Doctor crouched down, putting his ear to the floor. "It's coming through the final layer of earth."

"What is?" Nasreen asked.

The Doctor stood up again, noticing the sudden silence. He didn't necessarily have an answer to her question.

"The banging's stopped," Tony observed.

Now that the chaos was over, Ambrose had a chance to clear her head a little, and noticed something was off. "Where's Elliot?" she panicked. "Has anyone seen Elliot? Did he come in? Was he in when the door was shut? Who counted him back in? Who saw him last?"

In that moment, the Doctor knew he had made a mistake again. "I did."

"Where is he?" The mother worried.

"He said he was going to get headphones..."

"And you let him go? He was out there on his own!" Ambrose screamed.

Elliot came knocking at the door only moments later, but the moment he turned back, he was met with his fate, and sent down under.

Ambrose ran out searching for him despite everyone's protest, and when distracted by her own agony at the sight of her son's headphones on the floor, a creature attacked her from behind. "Get off me!"

Tony ran over just in time, pushing the creature off his daughter, and shining his flashlight on it, revealing it to be a human-like reptile. While Tony and his daughter stood processing the shock, the creature flicked its extensible tongue out and pricked his neck harshly, before retreating back into the graveyard.

Tony clutched at his neck in pain. 

"Dad!" Ambrose cried.

"What happened?" The Doctor ran over.

"My dad's hurt!"

"Get him into the church now."

"Elliot's gone!" Ambrose cried to him, letting go of her dad for a moment to face him. "They've killed him, haven't they?"

"I don't think so. They've taken four people when they could've just killed them up here. There's still hope, Ambrose. There is always hope. " The Doctor searched into her eyes, not sure if he was saying it more for her or himself.

**888**

The Doctor spotted a dark shape moving through the bushes with his infrared sunglasses. "Cold blood. I know who they are..." the Doctor smiled, almost tauntingly.

He headed back to the van, whistling and hitting it lightly, before somewhat discreetly taking a fire extinguisher out of it. A hissing sound roared behind him, and he saw a green figure quickly approaching him in the reflection of the car window.

The creature hit the side of the van, and the Doctor sprayed the CO2 of the fire extinguisher all over it, blinding and distracting it. The creature screamed, the Doctor screamed, and Rory also screamed: grabbing the creature from behind and throwing it in the back of the van, slamming it shut with the Doctor, safely trapping it inside.

"We got it!" Rory cheered, as the creature thrashed violently inside.

"Defending the planet with meals on wheels," the Doctor smiled, reaching for a victorious high-five, only to be interrupted by a rumbling again.

"What... what was that?" Rory asked again. He wondered how many times he would ask that question today.

"Sounds like they're leaving."

"Without this one?" Rory gestured to the creature in the van. The dark dome around them disappeared, revealing daylight again. "Looks like we scared them off."

"I don't think so," the Doctor remarked, eyes darting around the sky. "Now, both sides have hostages."

**888**

Amy woke up in something resembling a plastic coffin, with ridges on the cover so she couldn't clearly see out. Upon realizing the small space, she began hyperventilating, and pushing against the walls. "Let me out. Can anybody hear me? I'm alive in here! Let me out!" She screamed. "I know you're out there. My name is Amy Pond and you'd better get me the hell out of here or so help me I am going to kick your backside!" She threatened, pounding the casing with her fist, noticing a green creature approaching her with a syringe in hand. "Please?"

"Shh," the creature tried gently.

"Did you just shush me?" Amy immediately offended. " _Did you just shush me?_ "

Gas entered the coffin, almost as a response.

"No, no, no, no! Don't do that, no gas! No gas!" She protested. But the protesting stopped as she coughed, and fell asleep.

**888**

"Meredith!" I shouted. "Stop moving!"

Meredith turned around confusedly from the computer monitor she was staring at. "I've been standing here for like, half an hour."

"Really?" I sighed, exhausted from running. I was trying to get back to Amy as fast as I could. Meredith nodded. "That's not the point—you know about the orb going to France, right?"

Meredith sucked in a sharp breath. "Ooh, yeah, sorry about that. And a bunch of people were on director's orders not to tell you."

"Well, that doesn't matter, because it's not going to France anymore! Dylan's talking to Zodiac for me," I explained.

"Oh, Dylan! That's good," Meredith giggled. Although normally I would have over-analyzed her obvious matchmaking, I ignored it for the present moment.

"And I need to tell you something, just a warning, okay? I don't want you to freak out, because I might need your help." I eased.

Meredith furrowed her eyebrows and took off her glasses, placing them on the table behind her, as she always did in serious situations. "What is it?"

"Dylan can only stall the orb shipment for a few days, and I need it because it made me... you know." Meredith nodded. "Well... I need to take it back to the... place... with me," I stumbled carefully. "To see what it does. And I have a feeling it belongs there, and that... _he_.... Might know what it means... so—".

"Scarlette, no one's hearing you, just say it." Meredith urged me quietly.

"I think I need to bring the Doctor over here to help me figure out how to take it back to the other universe." I said, cautiously awaiting Meredith's response. She just looked at me with a frozen expression, silently. "Mer? Do you think it's a good idea?"

Meredith cleared her throat nervously. "Um, well, it seems like the only one."

I nodded. Meredith was my best friend, so I noticed her discomfort easily. But I didn't see any other way if I wanted to keep the orb, which I absolutely needed to do. "Okay, well, gotta go," I not so subtly tried to rush.

Meredith sighed, and nodded, knowing exactly where I was rushing off to.

**888**

"I'm the Doctor. I've come to talk," The Doctor introduced carefully, holding his hands up, showing he meant no harm.

"I'm going to remove your mask," The Doctor warned, kneeling down and taking the gray metal off the creature's face gently. The human-like reptile moved on all fours, gracefully yet defensively, not taking its eyes off him for a second. He grinned. "You are beautiful. Remnant of a bygone age on planet Earth; And by the way, lovely mode of travel, geothermal currents projecting you up through a network of tunnels," the Doctor kissed his hands out to her. "Gorgeous. Mind if I sit?" The Doctor grabbed a folding chair on the wall and moved to open it a few feet away.

"Now. Your people have some friends of mine." He sat in the chair, staring down. "I want them back. Why did you come to the surface? What do you want?" The creature didn't say anything, only continued staring at him carefully. "Oh, I do hate a monologue. Give us a bit back. How many are you?"

"I'm the last of my species," the creature tried quickly, still holding itself in a crouched fighting stance.

"Really?" The Doctor wondered seriously, for just a split second, before smiling again. "No, Last Of The Species—the Klempari Defense. As an interrogation defense, it's a bit old hat, I'm afraid."

"I'm the last of my species," the creature tried again.

"No. You're really not. Because if my friend doesn't get back to me, then _I'm_ the last of my species again, and I know how it sits in a heart—so don't _insult_ me." The Doctor raised his voice, and the creature noticed the tension. "Let's start again. Tell me your name."

The creature stiffened for just a moment. "Alaya."

"How long has your tribe been sleeping under the Earth, Alaya?" She faltered, and the Doctor knew why. "It's not difficult to work out. You're three hundred million years out of your comfort zone. Question is, what woke you now?"

"We were attacked," Alaya spat.

"The drill," the Doctor figured with regret.

"Our sensors detected a threat to our life support systems. The warrior class was activated to prevent the assault. We will wipe the vermin from the surface and reclaim our planet," she spat again.

"Do we have to say ' _vermin_ '? They're really very nice." The Doctor defended.

"Primitive apes." Alaya retaliated.

"Extraordinary species," the Doctor countered. "You attack them, they'll fight back. But, there's a peace to be brokered here. I can help you with that."

"This land is ours. We lived here long before the apes." Alaya reasoned.

"Doesn't give you automatic rights to it now, I'm afraid. Humans won't give up the planet."

"So we destroy them."

"You underestimate them."

"You underestimate us."

"One tribe of homo reptilia against six billion humans? You've got your work cut out," the Doctor warned.

"We did not initiate combat, but we can still win!" Alaya stood defiantly.

"Tell me where my friends are. Give us back the people who were taken," the Doctor tried.

"No!"

The Doctor sighed, standing up and putting his chair back against the wall. "I'm not going let you provoke a war, Alaya. There'll be no battle here today."

"The fire of war is already lit. A massacre is due." Alaya hissed.

"Not while I'm here," the Doctor rasped.

"I'll gladly die for my cause. What will you sacrifice for yours?" Alaya reprimanded.

The Doctor looked down, and smiled.

It depended on which cause you were talking about.

**888**

As the Doctor stomped out to the TARDIS, he stomped on a little faster when he noticed Nasreen following behind him. She announced to the group that he was going down to talk to the aliens, and Nasreen seemed to be the only one proud of the idea. Still, the Doctor wasn't sure about her in the TARDIS. "No, sorry! No. What are you doing?"

"Coming with you, of course. What is it, some kind of transport pod?" she wondered excitedly.

"Sort of, but you're not coming with me."

Tony approached behind them. "He's right, you're not."

"I have spent all my life excavating the layers of this planet, and now you want me to stand back while you head down into it? I don't think so!" Nasreen crossed her arms.

The Doctor looked at his watch. "I don't have time to argue!"

"I thought we were in a rush," she chided.

"It'll be dangerous."

"Oh, so is crossing the road."

"Oh, for goodness sake. Alright, then, come on!" The Doctor unlocked the door and stepped inside, closing the door behind him, still leaving Nasreen and Tony out.

"Hey, come back safe," Tony worried.

"Of course," Nasreen smiled, patting his cheeks before stepping inside.

**888**

As soon as Amy awoke the second time, she struggled against her restraints.

"Don't struggle! Close your eyes and don't struggle," The man next to her suggested.

"What? Where am I, why can't I move my body?" She asked, to no one in particular. However, the man was the only one around to hear her.

"Decontamination, they call it. They did it to me while I was conscious," he explained.

Amy's eyes were wide, though she did stop struggling. "Okay, you're freaking me out now. Did what? Who did?"

"Dissected me," he admitted. Amy noticed the fleshy red scar running from his sternum to his naval, and panicked even more.

"No, can't be. Look, have you seen another girl around here? Average height, sort of tan skin, brown hair that's kind of... glowy?" she tried. "Goes by Nova?"

"There's no one else. He's coming. I'm sorry, I wish I could help you," the man apologized, as a reptilian scientist approached Amy with a scalpel.

Amy couldn't help it—she struggled against her restraints.

**888**

"We're looking for a small tribal settlement probably housing around a dozen Homo Reptilia? Maybe less," the Doctor wandered around the caves.

Nasreen wandered to a different section than he did, finding something unbelievable. "One small tribe?"

"Yeah," the Doctor wandered in another direction.

"Maybe a dozen?" Nasreen breathed.

The Doctor sensed something in her voice, and realized what it was when he caught up to her. "Ah. Maybe more than a dozen," he looked down at the vast chamber that resembled an alien-city skyline. "Maybe more like an entire civilization living beneath the Earth."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since there's not much going on here, this is technically the end of The Hungry Earth episode, however, I will name the next one The Hungry Earth 3 / Cold Blood 1 just so i'm not annoyed at the uneven numbers.
> 
> I'm curious as to what you think Nova/Dylan/Meredith/Zodiac/Sally look like. Any fan casts/actors you would choose to play them? I know I have my own in mind...


	25. The Hungry Earth (pt 3) / Cold Blood (pt 1)

"That creature, do you think it was an alien?" Mo asked, cautiously following Amy though the underground tunnels after they narrowly escaped further experimentation. "Any more of them, do you think?"

Amy saw a shimmer of light before her, and smiled. "Funny you should ask that."

The man turned to her confused, before realizing what had just appeared in front of him.

**888**

I stumbled a little upon entering the Doctor's universe again, noticing the ground beneath me was somewhat like dirt. I tried not to make any noises of discomfort as the cross-universal pain hit me again, and once the ringing in my ears faded, I could hear who I was with, and felt a hand caressing my hair.

"Shh, I know, Mo, she'll get over it right now!" A Scottish voice snapped.

A different, wales voice spoke in disbelief. "But, how did she—".

"Science. Magic. Whatever works for you, I'm Nova," I sighed, reaching out my hand to shake his, still trying to even out my breathing, recovering from the pain. "And you're Amy, not the Doctor." I realized, as Mo let go of my hand after only a brief second.

"Uh, yeah?" Amy confirmed, trying not to be offended as we continued walking through the tunnels.

"No, I mean, I usually turn up near the Doctor, near the Time Lord, probably. So if I'm with you it means he's probably also around here somewhere," I explained.

Amy squinted at me, pondering the possibility, before becoming distracted by a door to her left. "Hey, I wonder where this leads?"

"Maybe it's a way out of here," Mo hoped.

Amy pressed the button, revealing a completely white area that seemed to be some sort of stasis room, with a young boy inside, some green plant-like attachments stuck to his face. 

I stepped back so Mo could see through the door window instead. "Or maybe not."

"Oh my god, no." Mo whispered.

"What is it?" Amy worried.

Mo struggled to somehow get the door open. "Oh god. It's my son. It's Elliot. What have they done to him?" he stepped back so now Amy could see through. "He's in there. We have to get him out! Elliot? Elliot, it's Dad!"

"Stop it!" I held Mo's arms back. "Look at him, I know it's hard to believe but he's fine. This screen is monitoring something and he seems to be in a stasis chamber. They're keeping him alive and healthy. I know this species, they're called Silurians, Homo Reptilia, and they're very similar to humans." It wouldn't hurt to confess what I knew to him to calm him down if Amy already knew about my foreknowledge.

"How do you know? What are you?" Mo began to worry, still not trusting me after seeing me literally appear out of thin air.

I gulped. "Uh, scientist. Also, kind of an alien. Though, also an alien scientist..."

Mo panicked, yanking his arms away from mine, until Amy turned around.

"Mo, I told you, she's fine! She's good! She's my friend, see?" Amy grabbed my hand and held it up before him, pointing to the monitors on the wall with her other hand. "Look, she's right. See these screens? Vital signs—heartbeats, pulses, why else would he be wired up? He's still alive." Amy still held up my hand to him, jerking it around as she explained herself.

Mo was still frazzled. "Alright. We find weapons, get that creature from the lab and force it to release Elliot, yeah?"

I opened my mouth, about to protest the forcing-weapon plan, when Amy yanked down on my hand she was still holding. "Yeah. Trust me. We'll get him out."

**888**

Ambrose sat on a bench in the graveyard, holding her son's headphones when Rory approached. "Ambrose."

She didn't even look at him. "You lied. You told us you were the police."

"It was a misunderstanding..."

"Who are you? You and the Doctor?" She turned to look at him now, with glassy eyes. "Why is this happening to us? What did we ever do?"

"The Doctor will get your son back, I promise. In the meantime, we take turns guarding the creature." Rory kept his voice low, trying to calm her down.

"Oh, so that's it? We just sit and wait!" Ambrose barked.

"And then we exchange her for your family." Rory crouched down beside her. "I promise you, Ambrose, I trust the Doctor with my life. We stick to his plan. We keep that creature safe."

Ambrose glared at him, turning back to sulk, staring at the peaceful scene before her.

**888**

The Doctor screamed in intense pain as he was strapped back to stand under a green laser that kept glossing over his frame, scanning him, and hurting him.

"How can they have escaped? This proves all prisoners should remain under military guard," Restac, the military leader, spat at the scientist. 

"I'm sure you'd prefer to be in charge of everything and everyone, Restac, but we rank the same," Malohkeh, the scientist, retorted, over the continuous screams of the Doctor. "Is there any word from Alaya?"

Restac looked away. "No."

"It's fine to show concern, you know. She's part of your gene-chain." The Doctor stopped screaming for just a few moments, as the scientist stepped over to a different panel. "I'm decontaminating now."

The Doctor widened his eyes. "Decontamination? No, no, no!" He screamed in pain again, his entire body shaking and vibrating and draining of energy even more than before.

"It's alright, it won't harm you. I'm only neutralizing all your ape bacteria." Malohkeh responded calmly against the Doctor's screams.

"I'm not an ape. Look at the scans. Two hearts. Totally different, totally not ape!" The Doctor struggled to explain through his teeth, the pain forcing his entire body to shiver. "Remove all human germs; you remove half the things keeping me alive!"

Malohkeh powered off the system, and the Doctor calmed down while Restac grew angry. "No, complete the process!" She demanded.

The Doctor focused on regaining his breath. "Oh, that's much better, thanks. Not got any celery, have you? No, no, not really the climate. Tomatoes, though. You'd do a roaring trade in those. I'm the Doctor." He smiled, before looking to his side. "Oh, and there's Nasreen. Good."

Nasreen awoke to Malohkeh shining something on her face. "Oh, green man!"

"Hello. Who are you?" The Doctor asked the Homo Reptilia glaring in front of him.

"Restac, Military Commander." She stated, a hint of pride in her tone.

"Oh dear, really? There's always a military, isn't there?"

"Your weapon was attacking the oxygen pockets above our city." Malohkeh explained to him.

"Oxygen pockets? Lovely! Oh, but not so good with an impending drill... Now it makes sense." The Doctor connected.

"Where is the rest of your invasion force?" Restac stepped closer to the Doctor in an attempt to be intimidating.

"Invasion force, me and lovely Nasreen? No. We came for the humans you took—and one Time Lord, though I assume she escaped," The Doctor knew Nova would have the strength and intelligence to use her locket if she went through the same pain he did. "And... to offer the safe return of Alaya. Oh wait, you and she, what is it, same genetic source? Of course you're worried, but don't be, she's safe." He assured her.

"You claim to come in peace..." Restac stepped away, and motioned for some of her army to approach the Doctor. "But you hold one of us hostage."

"I don't negotiate with apes. I'm going to send a clear message to those on the surface," Restac declared to Malokeh.

She was speaking to just Malohkeh, but the Doctor could hear. "What's that?"

Restac turned to the Doctor again. "Your execution."

**888**

"These chambers are all over the city," Amy observed, pressing her hand into a pod that lit up two doorways containing immobile Silurians.

"Turn it off, quick, they're not moving!" Mo panicked.

"No, wait..." I walked back over to the pod where Amy stood. "I think it's okay," I slipped my hand into the pod, the doorways lit up, and the glass doors in front of them slid up, allowing us to step inside with them.

"Oh my god, you're both mad!" Mo realized, as Amy and I both stepped into one of the chambers slowly.

"They have masks on." I commented.

"They're sleeping," Amy whispered.

I shrugged, getting abnormally close to the Silurian's face and trying to contain my excitement. "They're hibernating!"

Amy nodded, before crouching to the ground, and noticing they were standing on some sort of metal discs. "I wonder what these are?"

I pointed above us, to tubes that seemed to have the same circumference as the discs. "Look up. Take a guess," I helped, wanting her to figure it out herself.

Amy pondered a moment, before gasping. "Wait. I've got it. It's how they came up to the surface. Some sort of powered transport discs. It's our way out of here."

I smiled at her. "You got it!"

"Even better, weapons," Mo reached out to remove the gun from one of the sleeping Silurians. "Now we can fight back."

Amy looked to me, raising her eyebrows. There were only two weapons available. "You guys can take those," I offered, nervously tucking a hair strand behind my ear. I knew how to shoot a gun, of course, but I felt wrong about it in this situation.

I began walking ahead of them to a door at the end.

"Are you sure you know where you're going?" Mo asked me.

I smiled at him. "Not at all."

**888**

Rory and Tony rushed over to where Alaya was held when they heard screaming, finding her writhing in pain on the ground, and Ambrose standing a few feet away with a Taser pointed at her.

"Ambrose, what have you done?" Tony asked, defeated.

"She kept taunting me about Mo and Elliot and you!" Ambrose tried defending herself frantically, while Rory tried tending to Alaya's wounds on the ground.

Ambrose still held her weapon up shakily, with tears in her eyes. "We have to be BETTER THAN THIS!" Tony growled, firmly shaking the weapon out of her grasp.

"She wouldn't tell me anything!" Ambrose shrieked. "I thought sooner or later she'd give in, I would have done! I just—I just want my family back, Dad."

"I'm sorry," Rory kneeled by Alaya's side. "How do we help you? Tell us what to do."

"I knew this would come; and soon the war," Alaya barely croaked.

"You're not dying. I'm not going to let you, not today!" Rory decided, but it was already too late. Alaya gasped her last breath in victory, and the others in the room looked to each other in fear, knowing they were doomed.

**888**

"You're not authorized to do this!" Malohkeh condemned, following Restac as she led some members of her army along with Nasreen and the Doctor into the courtroom in chains.

"I am authorized to protect the safety of our species while they sleep!" Restac grunted.

"Oh, lovely place. Very gleaming!" The Doctor absorbed. The courtroom did in fact appear to be gleaming—rarely used and sparkling clean, high and mighty.

"This is our court and our place of execution." Restac glared at him.

**888**

"Let them go!" I called, walking into the courtroom swiftly with Amy by my side, holding up the weapon.

"Amy and Nova! Now there's some girls to rely on," The Doctor cheered, smiling brightly.

I felt a twinge in my head, and knew what was coming.

"You're covered both ways, so don't try anything clever, buster," Amy threatened Restac, who was slithering in front of her.

"Amy," I called, sounding drained. I tried my hardest to concentrate on my surroundings, trying not to let the sensation I knew was coming overtake me.

Amy only had to turn to me to a brief second to know what was about to happen. "Oh god, not now, Nova! Worst timing today, seriously!"

"What is she doing?" Restac hissed, turning back to the Doctor for an answer.

"Agh, I'm sorry!" I shouted, strained, as a memory took over my brain, and my body froze upright, though feeling a painful sensation before I was completely overwhelmed.

**888**

_"This is_ such _a bad idea!" I screamed, as multiple people, strapping me down so I had to stand upright, forced me back onto a machine. I couldn't stop the tears from flowing down my face._

_"This is not only for your own good, but for the good of our civilization." A woman beside me declared in monotone, as if she weren't about to stab me and possibly kill me. No—she thought what everyone else in the room thought: that this was their only option, so the consequences didn't matter anymore._

_Although there was a very bright light beginning to shine in my eyes, I could still make out the people watching me from the stands around me if I squinted hard enough. My squint was also more of a glare at the moment. "I would hardly call anyone in this room_ civilized! _" I spat, struggling against my restraints, until someone grabbed my neck and choked me, forcing me to lean back._

_"Attention, all. We are gathered here today to witness not only a first, and only trial of an experiment—but the amending of the supernova. Herein may lie our guilt, but also, our hope." The lady's voice echoed throughout the halls. No one cheered, but some clapped. They all knew what they were getting into. They all knew that sooner or later, I would come for them, or I would die. They all knew that both of those possibilities were just as bad._

_The choking stopped, and I was able to breathe again, though was still unable to move now that multiple wires and needles were attached to me._

_"Any last words before the process begins?" I knew the lady's booming voice was asking me this, despite the fact that I couldn't see her, and everyone else in the room could also hear it._

_Painfully, I moved my head down just a little, as much as I could, so I could get the perfect view of a man standing before me in the distance. He stood regally, sternly, and powerfully—but I knew the emotion that hid in his eyes. Perhaps, at this point, I was the only one left who knew._

_I swallowed hard. I was ready to face what was coming. I knew what was going to happen. It might work, but I knew what my first self was like. I knew I would figure out what the right thing to do was. I had faith in myself._

_I didn't want to let any of these people know that. I didn't want to be remembered here as some sort of delusional activist, crazed scientist, or a mere vessel for experiment. I wanted them to remember me as the symbol calm of hope I was always meant to be._

_I chose my next words carefully. They may have sounded insane or weak, but really, they were perfect. Soon, everyone on the planet would know them, and everyone on the planet would feel the same way about it, because naturally, they all underestimated me. But right now, that's what I needed them to do._

_I shook my head ever so slightly at the man in front of me._

_"I thought you loved me."_

_And then I felt the pain, surging into me like a thousand collapsing stars._

**888**

Restac easily yanked Nova's stiff form to the ground, and also removed Amy's weapon while throwing her to the ground, also. "And you!" she pointed the weapon to Mo, disarming him.

"Don't you touch them!" The Doctor shouted.

"All right, Restac, you've made your point," Malohkeh sighed.

Restac strode up to him. "This is now a military tribunal. Go back to your laboratory, Malohkeh."

They hissed at each other. When Malohkeh noticed Amy looking on in fear, however, he stopped, and lowered his head. "This isn't the way." He walked off, an idea in mind.

"Prepare them for execution." Restac ordered her group, once Malohkeh left the room.

"Okay, sorry. As rescues go, didn't live up to its potential," Amy admitted, as the five of them were shackled to a pair of columns with their hands behind their backs—Mo, Amy, and Nova on one, with the Doctor and Nasreen on the other.

"I'm glad you're okay," the Doctor smiled at her, despite the situation.

"Me too. What's going on with her, though?" Amy motioned to Nova, who was on the opposite side of the column, shivering violently, yet completely neutral in her facial expression.

"It's another flashback, but more powerful. She's having a physical reaction to this one. Must be... painful," The Doctor concurred, looking at her shivering form besides Amy with concern, wanting nothing more than to go over to her and do something about it.

"But she'll snap out of it like she always does, right?" Amy asked hopefully.

"Right," the Doctor concurred.

"Yeah.... Lizard men, though?" Amy finally allowed herself to marvel, not sure if she was allowed to add how Nova knew what they were.

"Homo Reptilia. They occupied the planet before humans— now they want it back." The Doctor explained briefly.

"After they've wiped out the human race," Nasreen added.

"Right!" A new level of panic crossed Amy's features. "Preferred it when I didn't know, to be honest."

The Doctor kept staring at Nova, hoping that maybe somehow it would get her out of this state faster, but nothing was changing, and he was just forcing himself into more worry.

"Why are they waiting? What do you think they're going to do with us?" Nasreen queried.

The Doctor finally looked ahead of him, noticing the Silurians all standing in a row, facing them, their weapons at hand.

A hologram appeared before them, and Restac spoke to it. "Who is the ape leader? Who speaks for the apes?"

After a brief moment, Rory's face appeared in the hologram. "I speak for the... humans. Some of us, anyway."

"Do you understand who we are?"

Rory hesitated. "Sort of. A bit. Not really."

"We have ape hostages." Restac's tone was completely hostile.

The screen widened, and Rory was able to see the whole room on his end. "Doctor! Amy! Nova!"

Ambrose also came into the hologram when she spotted her husband. "Mo! Mo, are you okay?"

Mo smiled. "I'm fine, love. I've found Elliot. I'm bringing him home."

Rory sighed of relief. "Amy, I thought I'd lost you."

"What, cause I was sucked into the ground? You're so clingy." Amy smiled.

"Tony Mack!" Nasreen shouted.

"Having fun down there?" Tony also appeared.

"Not to interrupt, but just a quick reminder to stay calm!" The Doctor interrupted.

Restac focused the screens back on her. "Show me Alaya. Show me, and release her immediately unharmed, or we kill your friends one by one."

"No!" Ambrose protested.

"Ambrose," Rory tried.

"Steady now, everyone," the Doctor also tried, weary of what was happening on the other end.

Tony held her daughter back. "Ambrose, stop it!"

"Get off me, dad!" Ambrose cried, removing herself from his grip before returning to the screen. "We didn't start this!"

"Let Rory deal with this, Ambrose, eh?" The Doctor suggested.

Ambrose didn't care. "We are not doing what you say any more. Now, give me back my family!"

A moment of tension swept across both rooms, when really, Restac had already made her decision. "No. Execute the girl!"

The girl they were motioning to was Amy, and Rory immediately pushed Ambrose out of the way. "No! No, wait! She's not speaking for us!"

"There's no need for this," The Doctor was still trying to keep everyone calm.

"Listen, listen. Whatever you want, we'll do it!" Rory pleaded.

"Aim," Restac commanded, ignoring everyone's cries as the members of her army pointed to Amy.

"Amy!" Rory cried.

"Rory!" Amy cried back.

"Don't do this!" the Doctor warned.

The screen went blank, and Restac gave her order. "Fire!"

"Stop!" A new voice boomed through the courtroom.

**888**

"Stop!" An echoing voice shook me from my memory.

I didn't know when it had started—but tears where flowing freely down my face and I couldn't bring myself to stop them. I was still shaking a little, and gasping violently, as if I had just come up from being underwater.

"Nova! Thank goodness," the Doctor breathed, noticing I was awake now.

I gave him a weak smile before quickly snapping my gaze away from him. I knew I should tell him what I had discovered, but I was afraid. It wasn't thoroughly explained, but a part of my consciousness knew exactly what happened, and almost couldn't believe it. But I was sure. And not for the first time, I was terrified of myself—of whoever I used to be.

"You want to start a war while the rest of us sleep, Restac?" A new Silurian followed by another scientist Silurian strode through the room calmly. I was able to regain my composure myself by focusing on their conversation.

"The apes are attacking us!" Restac defended.

"You're our protector, not our commander, Restac. Unchain them." He ordered, stopping at the other end of the table.

"I do not recognize your authority at this time, Eldane." Restac hissed.

Eldane only smiled peacefully. "Well then, you must shoot me."

Restac angrily strode up to the Silurian scientist behind him. "You woke him to undermine me!"

"We're not monsters. And neither are they." The scientist knew.

"What is it about apes you love so much, Malohkeh?" She retorted bitterly.

"While you slept, they've evolved. I've seen it for myself." Malohkeh marveled. He reminded me a lot of some scientists I knew; the ones that may have done some harmful things, but overall had good intentions.

"We used to hunt apes for sport. When we came underground, they bred and polluted this planet!"

"Shush now, Restac. Go and play soldiers. I'll let you know if I need you." Eldane demanded, somehow in complete tranquil.

"You'll need me, then we'll see," Restac glared, before striding out of the room with her firing squad behind her.

When she left, everyone was released from their chains, and the Doctor moved over to me before I could even move down the steps to the table.

"Nova, are you okay?" He asked, cupping either side of my face gently with both hands.

Once I had become aware of my surroundings in the room, I was able to stop myself from crying and keep my cool. But my face was still wet, the new information about myself was terrifying, and for some reason—someone asking me if I was okay when I least expected it always seemed to break me. "Yeah, I—I just," I couldn't stop the tears from falling again.

The Doctor moved his arms around me and held me closely, rubbing my back soothingly. I pressed my face into his chest, hating the sounds of my own sobs, but quieting them with the sound of his heartbeats. It was comfortingly distracting, until I was back to normal, and suddenly remembered my reality again.

"Doctor," I pulled away reluctantly, staring at the floor, not being able to look him in the eye. "On Gallifrey—I know what they did to me."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What they did to Nova, which will be explained in the next chapter, has a LOT to do with not only who she was- but why she's there now- with a new life, an erased memory, and with the Doctor. It will be a very long time before all the pieces are connected, but with more of them showing, maybe someone will figure it out! And notice how they already mentioned a supernova, and this flashback was definitely years, maybe even centuries ago? Hmm... So what do you think it is? Remember that it has a lot to do with Gallifreyan history!


	26. Cold Blood (pt 2)

The hologram was back on the screen for just a moment—just enough for the Doctor to tell Rory Amy was fine, and to bring Alaya back. I sat at the table next to Restac trying to calm myself down.

Again.

"I'd say you've got a fair bit to talk about," The Doctor leaned forward, his hands on the table.

"How so?" Restac folded his hands in front of him diplomatically.

"You both want the planet. You both have a genuine claim to it."

"Are you authorized to negotiate on behalf of humanity?"

The Doctor smiled, pointing to Amy and Nasreen on the other side of the table. "No, but they are."

"What?" Nasreen asked incredulously.

"No, we're not!" Amy huffed.

"Course you are. Amy Pond and Nasreen Chaudhry, speaking for the planet? Humanity couldn't have better ambassadors. Come on, who has more fun than us?" The Doctor tried convincing them, punching his fists excitedly and walking to the other side of the table.

"And what about you?" Nasreen looked to me pointedly.

I raised my eyebrows, lost in thought, or rather a numb lack thereof, not realizing she was speaking to me at first. "Oh, me? Not human," I smiled shyly, getting up to stand back next to the Doctor again, excluding myself from the picture. I had come to accept not being human now, but for some reason, I felt embarrassed admitting it in that moment.

Amy stood up suddenly, joining the Doctor and I and quickly asking, "Is this what happens, in the future? The planet gets shared? Is that what we need to do?"

Nasreen stood up curiously also. "Uh, what are you talking about?"

"Oh! Nasreen, sorry—probably worth mentioning at this stage," The Doctor threw his hands up and shut his eyes, as if he just truly forgot to bring it up. "Amy, Nova and I travel in time a bit."

Nasreen seemed more surprised at the fact that he didn't tell her rather than the actual fact, and crossed her arms. "Anything else?"

The Doctor gave Amy and I a look, before turning to pace around the room. "There are fixed points through time where things must always stay the way they are. This is not one of them. This is an opportunity—a temporal tipping point. Whatever happens today, will change future events, create its own timeline, its own reality. The future pivots around you, here, now! So do good, for humanity, and for Earth."

Everyone in the room gave him their full attention, and I knew they all felt the weight of this moment. However, to me, it already felt like a fixed point in time, because I already knew one outcome, and I was terrified of changing it. I kept telling myself that everyone will be okay in the end—because what if that's what the people on Gallifrey wanted me to do? What if they did that to me because wanted me around enough to change something? Making the call on whether or not the future was right or wrong made me feel like I was playing god, which was definitely not something I wanted to do. I knew what the consequences would be, but then again, I didn't.

Either way—I could not stop time passing. Either way, my presence was doing _something,_ and part of me was wondering whether or not I had a choice in how much it was doing anymore, whether I even wanted one.

Amy's eyes went wide. "Right. No pressure there, then."

"We can't share the planet! Nobody on the surface is going to go for this idea. It is just too big a leap," Nasreen tried reasoning with the Doctor.

"Come on." The Doctor looked her in the eye, grinning widely. "Be extraordinary."

"Oh, you..." Nasreen squinted at him, partially in awe, and partially frustrated. The usual reaction, it seemed.

I bit my lip, staring at the Doctor as he smiled at Nasreen. I thought too often about what he would say to me if he knew my situation, and finally came to the conclusion that it didn't matter. It was up to me.

"Doctor, can I do it?" I asked him, when he walked up to the table.

He looked surprised, but there was a hint of a smile in his voice. "Yeah."

I walked up to the table, and took a deep, excited breath. "Okay. Order," I pounded my hand on the table, as if it were a gavel. "The first meeting of representatives of the human race and Homo Reptilia is now in session."

I couldn't tell how to make it good or bad—but whether I liked it or not, I had power.

**888**

I followed the Doctor, Mo, and Malohkeh through the spiral of tunnels, in search for Mo's son. While the Doctor rattled on excitedly about the meeting, ("humans and their predecessors, shooting the breeze!") I stayed silent, preoccupied by my thoughts. Aside from the general crushing psychological weight of my foreknowledge and not being able to say anything about it, there was the problem of my flashback. I knew I had to tell the Doctor—but didn't know how. I was afraid of what it meant.

"Elliot. There you are," The Doctor found the pod he was resting in.

Mo rushed to the door. "If you've harmed him in any way—!"

"Of course not," Malohkeh interrupted assuredly. "I only store the young."

"But why?" The Doctor asked.

Malohkeh seemed giddy as he explained himself. It was a familiar giddiness to me. "I took samples of the young, slowed their lifecycles to a millionth of their normal rate so I could study how they grew, what they needed, how they lived on the surface."

There was an obvious sympathy in the Doctor's eyes. "You've been down here working by yourself, all alone?"

"My family, through the millennia..." Malohkeh looked down for a moment, but then smiled again. "And for the last three hundred years, just me." He turned to Mo. "I never meant to harm your child."

"Malohkeh, I rather love you," The Doctor placed his fist on top of Malohkeh's, who pounded it between his twice—a sort of Silurian greeting-salute-thing.

Malohkeh turned to the panel to open the door. "It's safe. We can wake him." The door swung open automatically, and Malohkeh carefully removed the plant-resembling wires attached to Elliott, before turning back to Mo. "Come."

Mo rushed in happily. "Elliot? Ell, it's Dad."

Elliot's eyes refocused at the sound of his voice. "What? Dad!"

The father hugged his son tightly. "You're safe now."

"But where are we?" Elliott asked as they released each other from their embrace.

Mo knelt down. "Well, I've got to be honest with you, son. We're in the center of the Earth, and there are lizard men."

I couldn't help but giggle at that statement—still finding it exciting despite all the things on my mind. Elliott noticed Malohkeh standing next to me, and the lizard man waved proudly. "Hi!"

"Wow," Elliott breathed.

The Doctor stepped in the room also. "Elliot. I'm sorry. I took my eye off you."

Elliott smiled sheepishly. "It's okay, I forgive you." He stepped out of the room, and turned to me, asking unashamedly, "who are you?"

I couldn't help but giggle a little again at the straight-forwardness of a question that I wasn't used to answering, that I barely knew the answer to myself. "Well, I'm the Doctor's friend."

The Doctor put an arm around me, and turned to Malohkeh, who was still at work with the panel. "You go on, Doctor. I'll catch up."

**888**

As we began walking, I carefully lifted the Doctor's hand from around my shoulder and held it at my side, trying to slow us down a bit. "Doctor, I know this isn't the best time, but if I don't tell you know I don't think I ever will."

"Okay," the Doctor whispered quietly, and quickly, already knowing I was talking about my memory.

I was still staring at the floor. "I was a part of some experiment, as a punishment for something that I don't know. It looked like a giant courtroom. They didn't know if it was going to work and—there was this man, and these—surgeons." I struggled to find words, somewhat even stalling myself in my own speech from getting to the point, and walking faster as I spoke.

"Nova," The Doctor stopped my walking suddenly, holding my hand tightly now. I still refused to look up. "It's okay. Whatever you did—you know yourself. I know you. It couldn't have been as bad as..."

The Doctor trailed off, and I knew he was talking about what he did to the Time Lord race. I also knew that he didn't know me well enough, and I was terrified that I might not have, either. "Doctor," I breathed, in disbelief as I said the words myself. "They reversed my regenerations."

I finally looked up at him, and he shook his head. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, it was the first and apparently only time they would ever do it—but they reversed my regenerations and the whole planet knew about it, and whether or not they were in the room the whole planet was watching. They called it The Amending of the Supernova." I took a deep breath. "And I'm honestly really afraid of what that means."

I didn't want to look at him again, ashamed and afraid—but once the Doctor caught my gaze, I couldn't look away. He gulped. His voice was low. There was something dark in his eyes, but I couldn't tell if it was fear or anger. "I think I know what it means."

I shook my head ever so slightly. "What does it mean?"

The Doctor began walking again, and I classified the feeling as a little bit of both. "It means someone brought you here on purpose."

**888**

The Doctor clapped loudly upon re-entering the room. "Not bad for a first session. More similarities than differences."

A whirring sound came from the other end of the room. Restac raised the reptilian bones on his face that closely represented eyebrows. "The transport has returned. Your friends are here."

I had forgotten about that part.

**888**

"That's not right. What are you doing?" Malohkeh asked, upon discovering Restac was waking up her army.

She pressed a button on the wall that released four more Silurians in full battle gear, standing in battle stance with their guns in front of them as Restac tilted her head at the scientist. "Protecting our race against the apes."

"You can't do this!" Malohkeh cried.

"You're a good scientist, Malohkeh," Restac cooed sarcastically. "But this is war."

Restac held up her gun without hesitation, and fired directly at Malohkeh's heart.

**888**

"Mum!" Elliott immediately ran over to his mother, hugging her.

I almost stood closer to the Doctor to offer some kind of warning about Alaya, but decided against it, part of me still afraid of whatever he felt when I told him about my memory in the hallways.

He quickly realized it for himself anyway, after everyone was done with their initial greetings. "Something's wrong."

"What's he carrying?" Amy asked, motioning to Tony holding a figure completely wrapped in a blanket.

"No. Don't do this." The Doctor grumbled in disbelief. "Tell me you didn't do this."

Mack lay the figure on the floor, and the Doctor kneeled before it, removing the blanket to reveal the Silurian's cold, dead face. He clenched his jaw, and looked up at Tony angrily, who only shut his eyes tight and stared at the floor. "What did you do?"

"It was me," Elliott's mom admitted. "I did it."

Elliott turned around in his mother's arms, backing away slowly. "Mum..."

"I just wanted you back," Ambrose tried holding him closer, but he shoved her arms away, moving away from her.

There was a long moment of silence and tension spread throughout the room, everyone staring at Ambrose with mixed emotions, none of them good.

The Doctor strode over to Eldane quickly, but he only turned away. "I'm sorry. I didn't know. You have to believe me; they're better than this."

"This is our planet!" Ambrose shrieked.

"We had a chance here!" The Doctor boomed.

"Leave us alone!" She shrieked again, mostly towards the people who were alien to her.

The Doctor strode to her angrily. "In the future, when you talk about this, you tell people there was a chance but you were so much less!" He shook as he spoke, "Than the best of humanity."

Restac and her army strode in fiercely at that moment, surrounding and outnumbering us greatly, weapons in hand.

"My sister!" Restac's face fell from stoic to hurt upon realizing the covered figure on the floor. She knelt down, and removed the blanket from her face slowly. Restac moaned awkwardly—something that must have been a trait of Silurians, but nonetheless, it was an obvious sound of mourning, and heartbreaking to hear. She covered her face again, and with tears in her eyes, glared daggers. "And you want us to trust these apes, Doctor?" she spat.

The Doctor tried, even though he must have known it was a lost cause. "One woman. She was scared for her family. She is not typical!"

"I think she is!" Restac stood to glare at Ambrose directly, and now both women were facing each other with glassy eyes, and violence in them, even if they were different types.

"One person let us down, but there is a whole race of dazzling, peaceful human beings up there." The Doctor paced around the room, eyes pleading to everyone, but no one moved. "You were building something here, come on! An alliance could work!"

"It's too late for that, Doctor!" Ambrose was breathing heavily, afraid, but loud anyway.

The Doctor spoke quietly this time. "Why?"

"Our drill is set to start burrowing again in..." she brought a watch out of her pocket in front of her shakily. "Fifteen minutes."

"What?" Nasreen squinted at Tony in disbelief.

"They had Elliot. What choice did I have?" He tried defending himself.

The Doctor still didn't want to believe it. "Don't do this. Don't call their bluff."

Ambrose wasn't giving up, and frantically began begging Restac, somehow still in a defensive way. "Let us go back. And you promise to never come to the surface ever again. We'll walk away, leave you alone!"

I stepped up cautiously. I couldn't help but feel a pang of sympathy towards Ambrose, and I couldn't necessarily explain it. She did what she thought was right, what she thought would work, and it didn't. I feared that would happen to me in the future. And now, I remembered what would happen next.

Restac growled, too engrossed in her anger to notice how close I was to her and Ambrose now. "Execute her!" She screamed.

"NO!" The Doctor shouted, but I had already yanked Ambrose by the arm and out of the line of fire towards an exit.

"Execute ALL THE APES!" Restac screamed with an amazing fury. Lasers went off in every direction, aiming at everyone including myself and the Doctor despite our technically not being 'apes'.

"Everybody, back to the lab. Run!" The Doctor shouted at us. Everyone began running ahead, but I couldn't help but stay behind until the Doctor came, almost out of habit—but he knew I had that idea. "Just GO, Nova!"

I stupidly tried not to cry, and ran off before anyone noticed. I allowed myself to be afraid again—not just of the creatures firing at me and my memories, but at the anger in the Doctor's voice, and the feeling that something had changed.


	27. Cold Blood (pt 3)

I watched as the Doctor zigzagged around the room, giving people orders. "Elliot, you and your dad keep your eyes on that screen. Let me know if we get company. Amy, keep reminding me how much time I haven't got."

Amy caught the watch the Doctor threw to her. "Okay! Um, 12 and a half minutes till drill impact!"

"Tony Mack!" The Doctor shouted, stopping in front of him and speaking rapidly, almost under his breath. "Sweaty forehead, dilated pupils, what are you hiding?"

Tony seemed to be having trouble breathing as he opened his shirt, revealing sprawling green veins across his chest.

Nasreen immediately fell soft, trying to study his chest. "Tony! What happened?"

The Doctor gave her a knowing smile she didn't catch as he scanned Tony with his screwdriver. Tony gulped. "Alaya's sting. She said there's no cure. I'm dying, aren't I?"

The Doctor went to fiddle with one of the control panels in the room. I couldn't help but get closer to see the veins up close. "You're not dying. You're... growing?" I wondered, waiting expectantly for the Doctor's answers.

Usually, this was the part where he would smile at me; explain something to me—anything but a hint of annoyance in his voice. "Mutating."

I swallowed hard, and Nasreen gave me a look, noticing that this wasn't what usually happened—and probably wondering what changed after seeing him panic over me in the courtroom when I first woke up.

I knew exactly what had changed. What had changed was that I told him of my flashback. Something in it scared him. Something in it made him angry with me, and I couldn't stand to hear it in his voice.

"How can I stop it?" Tony asked.

"Decontamination program. Might work, don't know. Eldane, can you run the program on Tony?" The Doctor asked.

"Doctor, shedload of those creatures coming our way. We're surrounded in here!" Mo interrupted, looking up from the security monitor.

"So, question is, how we do stop the drill given we can't get there in time? Plus, also, how do we get out, given that we're surrounded?" He spoke rapidly, stopping in front of Nasreen. "Nasreen, how do you feel about an energy pulse channeled up through the tunnels to the base of the drill?"

Nasreen frowned at him. "To blow up my life's work?"

The Doctor nodded. "Yes. Sorry. No nice way of putting that."

Nasreen sighed dejectedly. "Right, well, you're going to have to do it before the drill hits the city, in uh..."

"Eleven minutes forty seconds," Amy finished for her, watch in hand.

The Doctor smiled excitedly, going back over to the control panels. "Yes, squeaky bum time!"

"Yes, but the explosion is going to cave in all the surrounding tunnels, so we have to be out and on the surface by then," Nasreen explained.

Rory seemed mildly panicked. "But we can't get past Restac's troops."

"I can help with that." Eldane interrupted. "Toxic Fumigation. An emergency failsafe meant to protect my species from infection—a warning signal to occupy cryo-chambers. After that, citywide fumigation by toxic gas. Then the city shuts down." Eldane explained, seeming calculated yet sad.

"You could end up killing your own people," Amy worried.

"Only those foolish enough to follow Restac." He agreed solemnly.

The Doctor was staring at the floor. "Eldane, are you sure about this?"

Eldane nodded. "My priority is my race's survival. The Earth isn't ready for us to return yet."

"Ten minutes Doctor," Amy reminded him quietly.

"No..." The Doctor sighed. "But maybe it should be. So, here's a deal. Everybody listening!" He placed a hand on Eldane's shoulder momentarily. "Eldane, you activate shutdown. I'll amend the system, set your alarm for a thousand years time." He turned back to the group. "A thousand years to sort the planet out; to be ready. Pass it on. As legend, or prophecy, or religion, but somehow make it known. This planet is to be shared."

"Yeah. I get you," Elliot smiled.

The Doctor smiled back, snapping and pointing at him.

"Nine minutes, seven seconds." Amy clicked the watch.

The Doctor hopped back behind the controls, and everyone followed as he rambled on to himself, pressing buttons and flipping switches here and there. "Yes! Fluid controls, my favorite. Energy pulse. Timed, primed and set. Before we go, energy barricade. Need to cancel it out quickly."

"Fumigation pre-launching," Eldane confirmed, on a different control panel beside him.

"There's not much time for us to get from here to the surface, Doctor!" Rory panicked.

The Doctor only laughed. "Ah ha, super-squeaky bum time! Get ready to run for your lives. Now."

"But, the decontamination," I reminded the Doctor meekly, still somewhat afraid of myself.

He didn't glance at me, only straight to Tony, who was standing in the chamber, slouching. He struggled to walk out. "Well, go. All of you, go!"

"No, we're not leaving you here!" Ambrose protested, tears in her eyes.

"Granddad!" Elliot ran up to him, hugging him tightly.

"Eight minutes ten seconds," Amy reminded everyone.

Tony held his grandson in his arms. "Now you look after your mum. You mustn't blame her. She only did what she thought was right."

Elliott understood. "I'm not going to see you again, am I?"

"I'll be here, always." Tony put his hand over Elliot's heart, before hugging him again. "I love you, boy." He handed Elliott back to his mother. "You be sure he gets home safe."

Ambrose was crying now. "This is my fault!"

"No, I can't go back up there. I'd be a freak show. The technology down here's my only hope," Tony reasoned.

"I love you, dad," Ambrose cried, as her and her father embraced each other tightly.

"Come on," Mo pulled Ambrose away from Tony, and Nasreen had tears in her eyes as he walked back to the chamber.

Eldane placed his hand over a monitor button, and the system voice boomed throughout the city. "Toxic fumigation initiated. Return to cryo-chambers."

"They're going. We're clear," Amy announced, watching Restac's army outside the door leave through the security monitor.

The Doctor ran over to the doors and soniced them open. "Okay, everyone follow Nasreen. Look for a blue box. Get ready to run."

The Doctor walked up to Eldane and said earnestly, "I'm sorry."

"I thought for a moment, our race and the humans..." Eldane trailed sadly.

The Doctor nodded. "Yeah, me too."

"We've got less than six minutes," Amy told me.

"Let's go, he'll follow," I assured her, rushing everyone out. I knew Nasreen would stay behind.

**888**

The Doctor finally caught up to us, running faster to get ahead and open the TARDIS with his key. "No questions; just get in. And yes, I know, it's big. Ambrose, sickbay up the stairs, left, then left again, Get yourself fixed up—come on. Five minutes and counting," He rushed Ambrose and her family inside, before noticing a bright light behind him, and turning around to face it.

There in the wall, was a giant crack from the silence, fuming and bright. "Not here... Not now. It's getting wider." The Doctor worried.

"We should go inside," I suggested, not knowing whether or not it was a smart move to interrupt what would happen to Rory, but everyone ignored me, so the decision was made.

"The crack on my bedroom wall," Amy acknowledged.

"And the Byzantium. All through the universe, rips in the continuum," The Doctor knelt to examine the crack closer, and looked back to me for just a second—the first time he had truly acknowledged me since I told him, remembering what had happened to me.

"Some sort of space-time cataclysm. An explosion, maybe—big enough to put cracks in the universe. But what?" The Doctor rambled on. I closed my eyes tight, willing myself not to say anything.

"Four minutes fifty. We have to go," Amy tried, reminding the Doctor of our impending doom yet again.

"The Angels laughed when I didn't know. Prisoner Zero knew. Everybody knows except me!" The Doctor was frustrated now, not even paying attention to the city crashing.

"Doctor, just leave it!" Amy urged him, looking to me for help, but I couldn't say anything. I knew what was going to happen to Rory, and I was afraid of the Doctor being mad at me. I felt like I was letting her down in so many different ways right now, but I couldn't bring myself to think of anything that would simultaneously fix this and not destroy the timelines. Rory's countless deaths and re-births felt too big, too confusing, and too important for me to mess with.

Amy seemed to stop trying to urge me to say something when I brought my hands up to my face in distress. Little did she know that my distress was over the idea that I was about to let her fiancé die.

The Doctor got a red handkerchief out from his pocket, grinning wickedly. "But where there's an explosion, there's shrapnel."

"Doctor, you can't put your hand in there!" Rory pointed at him.

The Doctor only smiled and asked "Why not?" before doing exactly that anyway.

"Because it hurts," I whispered to myself in annoyance. Amy and Rory gave me a look signaling that they heard what I had said, before noticing the Doctor was screaming now.

"I've got something!" The Doctor shouted between screams.

"What is it?" Amy asked urgently.

The Doctor yanked whatever he was holding on to out of the crack, and fell back, the piece in his hand sizzling and he examined it from the floor. "I don't know."

"Doctor?" Rory asked, panicking upon noticing Restac crawling into the room, in pain, gasping, and a face full of fury.

The Doctor easily jumped up off the ground in one swift motion to stare at her.

"She was there when the gas started. She must have been poisoned," Amy recounted.

"YOU!" Restac shouted, slowly dragging a gun in front of her, attempting to aim it at anyone.

"Okay, get in the TARDIS, all of you," The Doctor commanded quietly, staring at Restac on the ground and standing tall, as if he were preparing himself for a fight.

"You did this!" Restac raised her weapon, and fired.

"NO!" I shouted on instinct, standing to the left of the Doctor and pulling him closer to me, and out of the line of fire.

However, as I did that, Rory also shouted, "DOCTOR!" and pushed him out of the way, and into me, causing him to be shot instead.

"RORY!" Amy screamed.

All of us ran over to him, kneeling on the ground beside his withering form.

"Rory, can you hear me?" The Doctor held him as he wailed in pain.

The Doctor used his sonic on him as the pain lessened a little, and his eyes darted around the room. "I don't understand."

"Shush. Don't talk," Amy caressed Rory's face, "Doctor, is he okay? We have to get him onto the TARDIS," She looked at him desperately.

"We were on the hill. I can't die here," Rory stared up at his fiancé, and the Doctor and I moved back.

"Don't say that," Amy whispered, tears falling onto Rory's slowly rising chest.

"You're so beautiful," Rory shook his head; giving her the most sincere look I had ever seen. I realized then that there were tears running down my face, also. Rory shut his eyes tight. "I'm sorry."

As Rory died, white streaks of light reached out to curl around his feet as Amy continued sobbing, her voice cracking. "Doctor, help him! Nova..."

The Doctor stood up and slowly moved towards the TARDIS, noticing the crawling light was only growing. "Amy, Nova... move away from the light. If it touches you, you'll be wiped from history."

I stood up, but Amy refused to leave Rory's side. "Amy..." I begged quietly.

"No. I am not leaving him! WE HAVE TO HELP HIM!" Amy shrieked, rocking back and forth manically, not taking her eyes off Rory's still face.

It was one thing seeing this on a TV screen. It was one thing remembering it in your head. But it was completely different seeing someone who you now considered to be your friend, crying over her dead fiancé, and knowing that you could have stopped it.

And also knowing that you couldn't have.

The Doctor crouched down behind Amy and grabbed her shoulders, focusing on the light while he shook her, making sure it didn't stretch to her. "The light's already around him. We can't help him," he told her, trying to remain calm.

"I am not leaving him!" She sobbed, gripping onto Rory's shirt until her knuckles were white as the Doctor tried pulling her back.

"We have to." The Doctor stated firmly.

"NO!" Amy screeched, the Doctor pulling her up now.

"I'm sorry!" The Doctor shouted over her as he held her upright, and began dragging her over towards the TARDIS.

"GET OFF ME!" Amy screeched again, thrashing in his arms.

Numbly, I opened the TARDIS doors and allowed the Doctor to drag Amy in. I stared at the silence engulfing Rory's body like a hundred sprawling halos, Amy's screams and the Doctor's apologies as the soundtrack. I was entranced for a moment, feeling like I was staring at a chaos I created—at a version of my own destruction, until I heard my name.

"NOVA! NOVA!" Amy shouted for me.

I was snapped out of my reverie, and quickly ran into the TARDIS and shut the doors behind me as the Doctor soniced them closed, preventing Amy from running out again.

"YOU!" Amy shouted at me, pressing me against the TARDIS doors harshly, the locks digging into my back, her scream surprising me, begging me between sobs, "You have to do something! You _can_ do something! I know you can!"

My eyes were still leaking tears despite the fact that I wasn't making noise, and now they were wide with shock. I had no idea what to say that would calm her in general, and that wasn't even including the fact that I didn't know what calming thing I would be allowed to say—whether the Doctor was in the room or not. "I... I don't—!"

Amy's eyes searched mine, and for just a moment she was calm—until she didn't find an answer in them. She grabbed my shirt and pushed me against the door again. "You LIAR! You know! You know how to fix this, you have to know!"

I couldn't help the sobs escaping my lips now—not only was Amy's anger towards me one of the most heartbreaking and terrifying things I had ever experienced, but as soon as she said the words _you know_ , I felt the trigger go off in my brain again, and it began pounding.

"Amy, please!" I begged, shutting my eyes tight and clenching my teeth to try and bear through the pain—so much so that I didn't notice the Doctor had come up to us.

"Amy, get off her!" The Doctor ordered, pulling Amy back from me, much as he had done before.

As soon as the Doctor had succeeded in pulling her away from me, he darted over to the TARDIS, pushing down a lever that set us in motion before anyone had the chance to protest. Amy ran over to him, putting his hands over his on the lever, as if she was trying to reverse it, break it, anything. "DOCTOR, NO! That light—I'm going to forget him! He'll never have existed! You can't let that happen!"

The Doctor snatched his hands from the lever and gripped her shoulders. "Keep him in your mind, don't forget him. If you forget him, you'll lose him forever!" He explained to her urgently.

"When we were on the Byzantium I still remembered the Clerics because—I, am a time traveller now! YOU SAID!" Amy rushed through the tears, gripping the Doctor's shirt, urging him to do something.

The Doctor moved his hands to hold the sides of her head. "They weren't part of your world, this is different. This is your own history changing!"

As the Doctor seemed to be studying Amy intensely—it seemed that all she could do was sob. "Don't tell me it's going to be okay. You have to _make_ it okay!" She screamed, before moving away from him and over to me again, this time only gripping my shoulders. "You can make it okay!"

At this point I assumed there couldn't have been a way to say that it would be better with time and make her believe it. I racked my brain, but there was nothing I could do personally. It just had to happen. "I—It's not... You just—Ugh!" I shook my head, staring down as my tears hit the floor, more frustrated than I had ever been in my life.

"You. KNOW!" Amy shouted again—and with those magic words, a wrenching pierce tore through my head, causing me to wail in pain, too. "It's not just killing _you_ , it's killing _EVERYONE ELSE TOO_!"

"Amy, stop it!" The Doctor pulled her away from me again. "You need to remember Rory. It's going to be hard, but you can do it, Amy," He kissed her forehead, before dragging her over to the pilot's chair. "Tell me about Rory, eh? Fantastic Rory, funny Rory, gorgeous Rory!" He sat her on the chair and knelt before her, urging her to face him, listen to him. "Amy, listen to me. Do exactly as I say. Amy, please. Keep concentrating, you can do this."

Amy stared into the distance ahead of him, scavenging her brain for memories, and shaking her head, looking at him fearfully and whispering, "I can't."

"You _can_. You can do it—I can't help you unless you do." He shook her by the shoulders. "Come on... We can still save his memory. Come on, Amy, _please_..." he urged her quietly. I could see the memories written across her face—but as soon as she seemed to remember something, she would be too shaken, and forget about it again. "Come on, Amy, come on." She stared at him with squinty eyes, trying to find something. He shook her again. "Amy, please. Don't let anything distract you. Remember Rory. Keep remembering. Rory's only alive in your memory; you _must_ keep hold of him. Don't let anything distract you! Rory still lives—in _your_ mind."

Amy's gaze was finally fixated on nothing, which meant it was working—but the TARDIS jolted, sending everyone flying to the ground, and Amy's memories of Rory into oblivion.

I got up quickly, seeing the Doctor starring at a small red velvet box on the floor, not daring to move a muscle, which I knew contained Amy's wedding ring.

"What were you saying?" Amy sat up, in the most terrifying chirpy voice.

She had forgotten.

I tried to tell myself it would be fine soon, and she would remember—but there was always that doubt in the back of my mind that I had changed something and nothing would fix. And the look of bewilderment and sadness and fear on the Doctor's face as he stared at her did nothing to help.

Mo and his family walked out of a hallway, interrupting. "I have seen some things today, but this is beyond mad!"

Amy grabbed the watch that had fallen to the floor. "Doctor, Nova," She whipped her head around to glance at me also, and flashed me a brief smile. Never have I felt so conflicted about such a short, simple smile. "Five seconds till it all goes up."

Everyone stumbled out of the TARDIS, myself rushing out last, to see the drill burst up in flames in the distance.

**888**

"All Nasreen's work, just erased!" Amy commented in bewilderment, walking across the graveyard and back into the church, as if she couldn't believe years of development could disappear in just a moment. But it could, unfortunately, in more ways than one—and the fact grew more depressing every second.

"Good thing she's not here to see it! She's going to give Tony hell when they wake up," Mo laughed behind her.

I took a deep breath, walking another direction and up to the Doctor who was leaning against a side doorway to the church.

"Um, Doctor," I spoke, unsure of my own voice as I approached the stone archway.

The Doctor did nothing—only slowly dragged his eyes over to me as I stood across him.

"I'm sorry." I said, as firmly as possible, crossing my arms

"For what?" He asked, hands in his pockets, looking at me with his head held high so a shadow draped over his face.

I shrugged, looking out at the graveyard, afraid of whatever emotion was written across his face, or lack thereof. "Everything that happened. And..." I took my locket out from in my shirt and in my hand, turning it over and over—an for the first time, wondered if it would be better if I stayed in 51 and never came back. "For being here. I don't know if I should..."

"No..." The Doctor trailed, and I thought my worst suspicions were confirmed.

I closed my eyes and moved to press the jewel into my locket, when I felt a hand over mine. I looked up, and saw the Doctor's face hovering closely over mine. "Don't you ever, think that," He breathed, and I could feel it.

He started at me fiercely, and I furrowed my eyebrows as I looked at him, trying to study the emotions on his face unashamedly. He seemed afraid of me before, and so sure that I had been somehow out to get him even if I wasn't aware of it, or someone was out to get him through me—but now there was something different there. I couldn't tell what it was, but I knew there was a lot of it. We stayed gazing like this for a while, barely aware of time passing— or simply not caring, until I remembered the orb.

I looked down, sighing. "Doctor, there's something I..." I looked up at him again, and his gaze hasn't wavered. "I've had this locket all my life," I started slowly, "But it didn't start working until I found my artifact, this orb, and... activated it, which activated this. But it's technically property of the US government right now and they want to destroy it."

I reached to pull the long chain of my locket over my head, and the Doctor gripped my wrist sharply. "Nova—you're connected to that, you can't take it off."

"I know," I placed a hand over his wrist and slowly moved it away. "My friend Meredith and I—we've experimented with it a little." The Doctor gave me a worried look. "A little! Everything's fine as long as I'm still touching it."

I slowly reached to move part of the locket chain over his head. Although the chain was fairly long and somewhat flexible, it didn't allow for _too_ much space, and our foreheads were touching now.

"Nova, I know this takes you to a different universe," The Doctor whispered, but I had already guessed that he figured that out. "What are you doing?"

"Whatever that thing is, I just can't let them take it," I whispered back, wrapping my hand firmly around the stone now, holding it up just to the side of our heads. "I need your help."

The Doctor didn't speak, only reached up and clasped his hand over mine, and squeezed it—pushing the button.

 


	28. Case

Since I was hugging the Doctor, I barely even stumbled when I landed, and was able to quickly move the locket back around just my own neck.

"Ow," The Doctor hissed through clenched teeth, a hand against his forehead. He was still for a long moment, recovering.

"Yeah, that happens every time. Though I didn't feel it so badly this time," I called back to him as I quickly began moving around the house, gathering papers that I left on the counter that I had prepared before last time.

" _Every_ time? I probably took most of it this round, then," The Doctor figured, spinning around and poking at random things in my living room. I stopped shuffling with my papers for a second and smiled at his antics. It was a strange sight I never thought I'd see—the Doctor leafing through my old DVD collection. "Sleepless in Seattle, really?" He grinned back at me.

"Um, none of your business!" I chided playfully, placing the papers in a manila folder and heading over to the coat closet. "Besides—Nora Ephron? Directing genius."

The Doctor peeked over my shoulder at a touchscreen panel I was messing with against the wall of my coat closet. "What are those papers? And what's that?"

"These papers," I turned away from typing for just a second to shove the manila folder into his chest. "Are going to be your identification, since I'm about 85% sure that either everyone will see through your psychic paper, or it won't be nearly enough documentation. Your codename is Ace and you're from the Farnborough unit shadowing me for a possible transfer to the French unit, which is also why you need access to my orb."

"You've really thought this through..." he shuffled through the documents. "And Farnborough?" He asked, thinking it was just a myth.

"In this universe, yeah." Finally, the code I typed into the panel worked, and the coats in the closet sunk into the ground, revealing an open space in the closet to step into aside from the fact that my normal floor wood paneling was now glowing blue. I stepped in and turned around. "Come on."

The Doctor stepped in, and before he could say anything, I rambled on—trying to brief him as quickly as possible. I had no idea how much time Dylan had bought me, or if he had even bought me any. I also grabbed a random actual white Doctor's coat and gave it to him, for good measure.

"Some things you need to know. They're trying to ship my orb to the Paris unit in France, which is what we call an _Artifact's Graveyard_ because they usually just stay locked up there forever and it's impossible to get them out. No one knows who you really are except for Meredith Powell, my number one best friend, short and blonde. My number two best friend, Dylan Ismael, brown-skin-green-eyes-broad-shoulders, doesn't know about you or anything, but I did ask him to stall the orb shipment for me. Professor Zodiac is my mentor and second dad, baldhead, thick Indian accent, can't miss him. My actual dad, Alejandro Rivera, is off on a mission and not here right now. However, his girlfriend Sally is here, also kind of short—dark-skin-tight-curly-hair."

The Doctor nodded, adjusting the new coat around his shoulders, processing everything I just told him all at once. "Anything else?"

"Oh yeah, my name is Scarlette."

**888**

"Scarlette! Thank god," Dylan rushed up to me, hugging me almost unbearably tight as soon as he saw me in the bleak white hallway, not caring much for the Doctor at first despite the fact that I knew he noticed him.

"Dylan! What happened?" I pulled away.

Dylan stepped closer to me. "You didn't hear? Someone was murdered in the storage facility. Looks like I didn't even have to stall the shipment after all—nothing's getting in or out."

"Sorry—did you say _murdered_?" The Doctor interrupted, stepping next to me.

"Ten-Four." Dylan confirmed sternly, much in the way he was used to confirming orders in the field—which probably only confused the Doctor. "Who is this guy?" Dylan asked me, as if he weren't standing right there.

"This is Ace, who I've mentioned a few times, from the Farn unit." I gestured toward the Doctor, stepping aside.

"Good to meet you," the Doctor smiled politely, shaking his hand. "Ace—my code name, not my real name. Though it is nice, don't you think? Snappy. _Ace._ " He smiled to me, as if in thanks for the code name, and then turned back to Dylan expectantly.

Dylan squinted at him, still firmly shaking his hand, albeit very slowly. "Sure..." Dylan spun on his heel and pulled me closer to him by my upper arm, whispering in my ear as we began walking, the Doctor following behind. "Where the hell did you find this one?"

I couldn't help but laugh a little. "Long story."

**888**

"Scarlette! Just the girl I needed. Location of the murder was just released and it seems we now require a statement from you," Zodiac explained, coming in from an adjoining hallway on my right and immediately matching my pace.

"You all speak of murder here as if it happens often," The Doctor inquired from my left side.

"Apologies, sir, may I have your identity?" Zodiac asked. The Doctor was about to respond verbally, until he noticed Zodiac had his hand outstretched, so the Doctor reached into his jacket and pulled out the folder I gave him. Zodiac scanned the contents quickly. "Ace, to answer your question—nothing that happens here happens often, so it seems we approach every random event—which is all of them, with normalcy. I assure you there hasn't been a murder in our grounds since '96, which is more than what Farn can say," Zodiac peered at him over the tops of his glasses condescendingly.

Unfortunately, the Doctor had no idea what he was talking about, and looked to me for help. I only smirked as the Doctor stuttered. "Of course—sorry, sir, I didn't mean—"

Before the Doctor could apologize anymore, Zodiac burst into a deep, booming laughter. "Oh, I'm only playing! I'm always telling Steven at Farn that he's far too intense. Aren't I, Scarlette?" Zodiac nudged my arm.

I nodded. " _Always_ might even be an understatement."

"Your structure is just so _rigid_ , in my opinion. Has anyone briefed you on our departments yet?" Zodiac asked the Doctor.

The Doctor tried his best to seem like he knew what was going on. "I—"

"I was just about to do that!" I interrupted.

"Oh, well why don't we let Dylan do that—You have to come with me right now, Scarlette," Zodiac stopped in his tracks outside a door that was annoyingly familiar to me, motioning that was where we had to go.

I was about to protest, when Dylan turned me to face him by grabbing my elbow. "It's fine, Scarlie, you're always doing transfers—I got this one." He smiled.

I wanted to try to protest again, but Dylan quickly lead the Doctor away, and Zodiac ushered me into the room.

**888**

****"Scarlette's in the science unit, studying the objects and creatures we find. I'm in the field retrieving them, and our good friend Meredith over here, last but not least, is the techie, using computers and codes to help both of us." Dylan approached Meredith, who was in a busy corner of a large room with other members of the technology department. It bore the most resemblance to a typical office floor with cubicles—aside from the fact that it was not typical at all.

The cubicles were huge—every space having at least five monitors and towers of servers to themselves, and parts of them seemed to be glowing different colors—what the Doctor assumed to be alien tech adopted to create a filing system. The lights were off in the wide, basketball court-sized room because they weren't needed—pieces of technology were emitting light all over the place. And if that didn't make things seem atypical—there was also the fact that Meredith's space was extremely distinctive: fluffy pink objects adorning as much space as it could.

Meredith immediately shot up from her seat upon noticing the Doctor and Dylan entering the room, adjusting her glasses on her face hastily. "Oh, Dylan! And—Ace!"

"You've met?" Dylan asked.

"No, Scarlette just told me." Meredith recovered so quickly that if the Doctor hadn't known better, he would have assumed it was intended. He assumed she had to learn to be that good when working with someone with Dylan's skill set.

"GUYS!" Nova burst into the space before anyone could continue, gasping for breath.

"What is it?" Dylan worried.

Meredith only sighed. "Oh, not again. I know that face you're making."

"I'm not making a face," Nova defended herself.

"Yes you are," The Doctor stepped forward. " _Adventure_ face."

Dylan and Meredith both raised their eyebrows, for entirely different reasons.

**888**

"So why did Zodiac need you?" Dylan asked, everyone struggling to keep up with my pace and direction. As soon as I found them, I darted right back out of the room and began walking and zigzagging through hallways as fast as I could. With the place on lockdown after the murder, all of the transports were shut down—but it also gave me an advantage.

"The murder took place in the transfer unit." I breathed, sharply turning right again.

"So?" Meredith asked nervously, skipping a little in her step to keep up.

"In the section where my orb was."

Dylan grabbed me by my wrist and stopped me in my tracks. "Scarlette, I know what you're thinking, it's not a good idea."

"What am I thinking?"

"That this is the perfect opportunity to take your orb."

"Wrong." I began walking again. "I was _thinking,_ that this is the perfect opportunity to show Ace our transfer unit."

"Right! I'd love to see that," the Doctor smiled.

"Scarlette, this is the _worst_ opportunity for that." Dylan ignored the Doctor.

"You didn't let me finish. To show Ace our transfer unit... and how to solve a murder." I stopped at a gray metal door and tapped on it, revealing a keyboard with strange symbols on it. I typed a certain pattern into it before it opened.

"...How did you even do that?" Dylan asked, bewildered.

I stepped in, motioning for them to follow. I didn't have the energy to explain how long it took for me to figure it out, and settled for, "I know how stuff works."

**888**

We stepped into a dark hallway that was only glowing dim shades of blue due to some lights tracing the wall on the floor, and as soon as the doors closed, Dylan asked—"Ace isn't here as a transfer, is he? You called in a friend to help take the orb."

It was technically the truth, so I nodded, following the right wall. "Yes. And it's not Ace, it's the Doctor."

"The Doctor... what?" Dylan asked.

"I believe the correct term is _Doctor Who_ ," Meredith smirked, and I nudged her side.

"It's just the Doctor, mate. Good to really meet you this time," The Doctor offered a hand again and Dylan shook it, though not reacting any better than last time. "I'm really an expert at this sort of thing."

"No you're not," I rolled my eyes.

"I sort of am." The Doctor retorted playfully.

Dylan, who was walking ahead of us, held out an arm and stopped us in our tracks. "Well then, if you're such an expert, what do we do about _that?_ " Dylan pointed at a bright blue floating square shape in the distance that was blinking red and approaching us quickly.

"Well, basically..." The Doctor started.

I prepared myself, knowing what he was going to say next. "Oh, great."

"RUN!"

**888**

We all ran for our lives, but saw no other way we could go once we made it back to the entrance—which was locked shut. We turned to face the blinking square that was growing bigger and nearer to us, our backs against the wall as if we could sink into it and hide.

"What are we going to do _now_?" Meredith panicked, beginning to hyperventilate.

The Doctor ran from one side of the wall to the other in front of us, moving his hands along the wall and trying to find something. "Is there a panel with some sort of installation protocol, or an alarm code? Or maybe this thing is sentient, or—."

"This thing obviously isn't _sentient_!" Dylan chided.

"Dylan! You never know!" I argued.

"Seriously, Scarlette, what the _hell_ has gotten into you?" Dylan argued back. "It's not sentient, there aren't going to be any control panels, and we shouldn't have come in here in the first place!"

The Doctor stopped feeling at the walls now—him and Meredith exchanging looks as they paid attention to us despite our impending doom. I huffed. "Someone was murdered by _my_ artifact, _that's_ what's gotten into me!"

"I know you hate thinking about it, but we really do murder people here all the time!" Dylan glared.

I was so frustrated at his statement that I couldn't think of anything to shout besides—"NO!"

I stared at the orb blasting towards us, and shut my eyes tight out of fear and frustration—until everything went white.

For a brief second, I thought I had died, until I heard Meredith stumble with an " _oof,_ " noise and opened my eyes, noticing that the square had disappeared, and normal fluorescent lights were on.

I looked to the doorway to see that Sally had caught Meredith, who stumbled out of it when the door was suddenly open. "Uhh... _hey_!" Meredith greeted awkwardly.

Sally released Meredith's arms and stepped into the room, giving me a pointed look and raising her eyebrows. "How about—the next time you think about trying to solve a murder on your own..." Sally approached me slowly. "Ask me for help, too."

I breathed a sigh of relief, and then asked, "How did you know it was my idea?"

Sally laughed, gesturing towards Meredith and Dylan. "Oh please, with these two golden stickers?"

It's not as though I was a rule-breaker, but Dylan and Meredith were known for being exceptionally good and loyal. Sally walked up to the Doctor slowly also, looking him up and down. "And you must be Ace," She shook his hand, before turning back to me. "Whose credentials were _definitely_ faked. But don't worry—only I caught it." She winked.

"So I assume that allows you to know I am actually _The Doctor,_ " He smiled, and shook her hand.

"Nice to meet you. I know Scarlette brought you here, but I don't completely trust you." Sally admitted casually.

"Good choice." The Doctor nodded.

**888**

"So, I've been looking into it a little, but I'm going to need to access the security footage to find out more," Sally walked us up to a locked steel door.

"Wouldn't the security footage be damaged?" Dylan asked.

"Of course. But it's not the footage that we need—it's the way it was damaged." Sally explained. "Meredith... we could use your expertise here."

Meredith seemed lost in thought until her name was called, and her eyes went wide once she realized what Sally was asking of her. "OH! —Oh no, I can't do that..."

"Why not?" The Doctor asked.

"Because it's... illegal?" Meredith stated this as more of a question, but anyone who knew her knew that this was definitely her answer. For a reason only few know, Meredith swore off any action that would even be considered the tiniest bit illegal to her years ago.

"Oh, for the millionth time Meredith—everything we do here is technically illegal," I pointed out.

"Hey," Dylan put a comforting hand on her shoulder. "You're helping solve a murder. That's not a bad thing."

Meredith sighed, before stepping up to the door and tapping on it until a screen showed up. She stared at it for just a few moments until gears in her brain seemed to click, and she began typing in symbols at lightening speed, her eyes darting behind her glasses, until the door slid open.

**888**

Sally immediately knew where to look and brought the hard drive back to us after climbing up a server tower to get it. "Just as I expected."

"What?" Dylan asked.

"I suspected it would be a field agent who did this since murdering with a gun is something they might have to do—and the fact that this footage has been physically damaged rather than through a computer further proves my point." As soon as Sally had this revelation, both her and the Doctor turned to look at Dylan, but I didn't want to entertain the idea. "Whoever did this was trying to steal the orb, but then got caught and shot the unsuspecting agent who interrupted them."

"No, wait..." They looked back to me. "Why would someone want to steal _my_ orb?"

Sally sighed. "Here at 51, the requirements for promotions are not studies—but experience, and specifically, _years_ of experience. You three," Sally nodded to Meredith, Dylan, and I, "were put together because you're all head-starters. You got into 51 before you were supposed to, so now you all have more years than everyone else. That makes you an easy target for many who put in effort but got in at a normal time—or possibly even late. People disagree with you, Scarlette—because not only are you the _only_ head-starter in the science department—but you're the earliest one we've ever had."

"This orb was a huge breakthrough for you. You proved yourself ahead through this, so someone might be trying to take that away from you—or maybe help you out by destroying it in case it malfunctions in France since we never got to finish tests. There's a chance they wanted to experiment on it by themselves—but the damage to the footage really hints at a field person. It has to be an un-advanced field agent who has something against you... or maybe something _for_ you."

**888**

When we approached the room where my orb was being held—or the _crime scene_ , I pulled the Doctor to the corner of the room, while Meredith and Dylan spoke with Sally. "Do you know what it is?"

The Doctor stared at it. "I do. But that has to wait for later," The Doctor looked back to me. "Right now, I need to know, how many field agents do you communicate with?"

I shrugged, not expecting the conversation to turn this way. "Really just my dad and Dylan—the only other people I talk to are from the science department."

"Who do you think it is?" He asked carefully.

"I think it's Sally," I lowered my voice even more. "She used to be a field agent before getting promoted to head of transfers, and tried to advocate for a law against head-starters before she started dating my dad. She just seemed to stop talking about it after that... so maybe she was doing that to get close to me and make me stop thinking about it? Or maybe destroy it in my favor to secretly prove herself or something?"

"It can't be Sally..." The Doctor trailed. "I think it's Dylan."

" _Dylan?_ " I asked incredulously. "It can't be Dylan!"

"Why not? He's an un-advanced field agent who may have something either for or against you—it makes sense. He's the only other field agent you talk to besides your dad."

"No, it just can't be. I've known him forever—he's my best friend, and..." The Doctor raised his eyebrows, waiting for me to add something as I nervously glanced around. "It just _can't_ be, okay?"

The Doctor took a deep breath. "Okay."

**888**

"Where did Sally go?" I asked, upon returning back to the group and noticing her absence.

"I don't know," Dylan shrugged. "Meredith and I started talking and she just left..."

"Okay..." I looked to the exit, suspicious.

"I think she just had something to do," Dylan added.

"Doctor, what are you doing?" Meredith asked, softly, gently, in a voice that distracted Dylan and I.

The Doctor was standing only about a foot away from the orb, which was the only item in a glass case shelf, with part of the shelf perfectly missing to fit the size of the orb. "I'm just going to see..."

The Doctor reached out his hands slowly to touch the orb by the sides, and Meredith panicked. "No, stop that, don't touch it!"

The Doctor paused for a brief moment, his hands in mid-air, craning his head back to Meredith. "Why not?"

"Because it's not yours." Meredith reprimanded.

"I think it might be," The Doctor reached his hands out further, grabbing the orb quickly.

"NO!" Meredith screamed, standing directly behind the Doctor and pointing a white gun that appeared to have certain edges that bulged out—a gun that appeared to have alien properties.

"Meredith, put that down!" Dylan demanded, stepping closer to her, but not moving to pry the gun from her hands.

"Meredith, what are you doing?" I asked, walking towards her and the Doctor slowly.

"It was me, okay? _I_ did it. And Sally went back because she realized she knew how to extract the video from the damaged hard drive. She was going to find out!" The gun was shaking in Meredith's grip. It looked unnatural in her small hands.

" _Why?_ " I asked vehemently, barely believing what I was hearing.

Meredith's voice was shaking as much as her hands. "Before I came to 51, Scarlette, I had a little sister. She was _just_ like you. She was smart, and pretty, and taller than me, brunette, in love with science—really nerdy. And we were best friends, _best friends_ until the day I was being chased by 51 and she abandoned me. She ran away with her _stupid_ boyfriend and I never saw her again and I got trapped in 51 and she didn't, because she _died_ instead! And when I met you, I knew you were just like her, but I knew there wouldn't be a _stupid boyfriend_ to take you away because we're all _stuck_ in here. But then the Doctor came along and you travel all over the place in another universe with him. And then it was real."

I shook my head, standing right next to the gun's aiming range, facing her. "Meredith—the Doctor's not my boyfriend, and he's not going to take me away from you."

Dylan was beyond confused. " _Another universe!_ What—?"

"YES HE CAN!" Meredith interrupted Dylan's confusion. "So I came in here to try and shoot the orb to destroy it, but then someone walked in and I just—" Meredith couldn't finish her sentence, and began sobbing. "You could _die_ out there and I wouldn't know!"

"She's not going to die. And technically, I can't die either—not by a gun. You know who I am." The Doctor had his hands up defensively, and was looking Meredith in the eye.

"Oh yeah—I know who you are! I know who you are _so well_ that this gun isn't just a normal gun—it shoots once and the bullet lodges in your body, waits thirty seconds, and then shoots upwards. It will shoot twice. It will stop your regeneration." Meredith gained a new sort of anger as her sobs turned into something else.

In that moment, the door opened, and a small group of people flooded in—but I didn't dare take my eyes off of Meredith.

"Stop this!" I interrupted, this time standing between her and the Doctor. "This isn't you!"

The Doctor put a hand on one of my arms, trying to urge me out of the way, but I forced myself to be unafraid of Meredith, and put my hand over his to move it away as I kept walking forward, right towards the barrel of the gun. "I know who you are, Meredith. This isn't you."

I slowly reached out my hand to put it over hers—the one holding the gun. I moved her hand down slowly, until the gun was lowered to the ground and I took it out of her grasp. I held it out to the side and Dylan took it from me, as Meredith stared at the floor, crying. "This isn't me... _this isn't me_."

I began crying too, and hugged her close to me. "I know, I know."

As we cried on each other's shoulders—knowing this was the end of something, a voice boomed in the background, confirming our suspicions. " _Meredith Powell,_ you are under arrest for murder, and a Protocol 8 Emergency Court is to be established under your name..."

As the officer rambled on, Meredith's sobs became worse.

**888**

"Meredith's court date is tomorrow... I have to be there," I explained to the Doctor as he poked around at the TARDIS console.

"I know," he looked up at me. "Has anyone said anything about the orb being missing?"

I shook my head. "No, Sally took care of it and gave me a pass after everything."

Despite the fact that I just took the Doctor to my home—there has never been this many things left unsaid between us. I stared at the orb, which was placed in a circle-shaped holder on the console, the coffee color with bright yellow lights floating around inside it like fireflies now, and I wondered what it did. The Doctor hadn't told me yet—but then again, there was everything else we weren't telling each other: why he was so mad at me, why he then suddenly wanted me to stay, why Amy was mad at me and then forgot, how I knew what was happening next, and how I had no idea how I felt about any of it.

I walked over to the TARDIS doors and turned to face him. "Take Amy somewhere nice for me."

He nodded, and I pushed the button.

**888**

Dylan Ismael paced in Scarlette Rivera's living room. He realized that even with the amount of weirdness he went through that day with her, even with the fact that she was obviously lying to him—he still felt the same way about her.

She was brave when she stopped Meredith from shooting, but not only that, she cared and understood. She could have easily been mad, but she held Meredith and cried. She understood the weight of that moment. She understood Meredith. She understood Dylan.

He liked to think that even if he didn't know everything that was going on with her—he still understood her. He knew her character. He knew her heart.

He knew he had to tell her.

He had been thinking about this for a while, and thought that he had never been more sure of this in his life. Until—just like the hundreds of times before, Scarlette Rivera proved him wrong.

Somehow—she materialized in the middle room (rather than walk through the door, like Dylan expected), and didn't even seem phased by his presence. Instead, she walked up to him, grabbed both his hands, and said very urgently—"Dylan, I _really_ need to say something to you."

In a few hours' time, Dylan did not realize he was any less in love with Scarlette Rivera after she told him the truth. The only thing he realized was that he was in love with Nova, too.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you actually read this chapter I thank you SO much! I hope you enjoyed it. I actually wrote a bunch of scenes out, and then put them together like puzzle pieces- so you'll notice it seems like there are a lot of breaks.
> 
> Please tell me your thoughts on all these characters, I love them all with all my heart and I raised them all myself. If you're interested there's a small book of short stories about how each of my OCs in this book came to Area 51 on wattpad-- username astra0. i would post them here but i'm not sure if i'm allowed to?


	29. The Lodger (pt 1) / Court (pt 1)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i know that i skipped vincent and the doctor-- that's where the doctor took amy when nova told him to taker her "somewhere nice," and when i was outlining everything a long time ago i realized it would be better and more realistic if i skipped it-- after everything that happened, the doctor and nova probably need some time away from each other, and nova needs to spend more time being scarlette.

I ran down the ornate hallway—one of the only hallways in Area 51 that had more to it than just white and gray concrete. There were pillars every few feet, high ceilings with chandeliers, shiny dark brown floors, and intricate marble trimmings along the middle of the walls.

I almost slid on the shiny floor as Dylan caught me in his arms. "Woah, careful—"

"I did it!" I regained my breath, stepping away from him and giving him his cell phone. "I integrated the communication tech we found in Constantinople into our phones, so now it _should_ work across universes, because it's a direct line."

Dylan took his phone back from me, and put it in the pocket of his suit. Dylan wearing a suit was definitely not a sight I was accustomed to seeing, but everyone had to be dressed their best for court proceedings as an unspoken rule of our society. "Are you sure about this?"

"Only one way to find out," I took my locket out from inside my knee-length red dress.

"Scarlette!" Dylan hushed, grabbing my hands, which were holding the locket. "Right here? Right now?" He nervously looked around at the other similarly dressed people loitering the hall around us, waiting to get inside the court.

"Not right _here_ ," I stated obviously. There was no way I could just disappear in front of these people and get away with it. "But of course right now!"

"Why can't you just wait until after the hearing?" Dylan asked.

"It's going to take all day. I would have gone back earlier, but I wanted our phones to be fixed in case anything happened. It's been two weeks—I don't know what I missed. I'm not going to wait any longer. But I promise it'll just be quick."

Dylan stepped away from me and let me go, knowing he couldn't argue with me about this.

**888**

"Just tell her." Craig told himself, staring at the picture of him and Sophie—the girl he should tell, hung on his refrigerator. "Just tell her—I love you. _I love you._ " Craig hit his head against the refrigerator in frustration, trying to practice. "Oh, just. _Hey, I don't know if you knew..._ "

Craig's soliloquy was cut off by a ringing of his doorbell.

He wondered who it could possibly be for only a split second—until he saw Sophie left her fluffy pink keys on his table, and snatched them up. "Oh, every time!"

"I love you, I _love_ you," Craig practiced saying to himself, as he walked over to the door to open it, and finally admit the truth to his best friend.

He opened the door wide, and didn't realize it wasn't Sophie behind it until he had already gotten through the sentence, "I love you."

The Doctor cocked his head, trying not to smile weirdly. After all, it could be a custom he didn't know about. "Well, that's good, because I'm your new lodger. Do you know," The Doctor took the fluffy pink keys from Craig. "This is going to be easier than I expected."

**888**

I was walking through the court hall as fast as I could while simultaneously trying not to draw any attention to myself. I honestly thought I was doing a pretty good job of it, right up until Sally found me, and stopped me in my tracks.

"Scarlette, I need you to know this—" Sally grabbed my arm. She was usually cool an collected, and always seemed to have a trick up her sleeve, so it was unnatural to see her acting so urgent.

"What is it?"

"I love your father." She blurted out to me. "I would _never_ do anything to hurt him. I would _never_ do anything to hurt you. Okay?" She looked me directly in my eye, telling me this sincerely, waiting for me to say something.

I didn't know what this was about, and I wanted to give it more thought—but I didn't have the time, and suspected I was going to find out soon anyway. All I could manage was an "I know," before walking off again.

**888**

"These are your keys," Craig grabbed a simple metal ring with three keys on them.

"I can stay?" The Doctor asked excitedly, moving to stand in front of Craig.

"Yeah, you're weird and you can cook– it's good enough for me." Craig chuckled, holding up the keys in front of him and holding up each one individually, explaining what they were for. "Right—outdoor, front door, your door."

The Doctor wasn't even paying attention to the keys being held up, and was busy smiling at the fact that they were his. "My door, my place, my gaff!" He snatched the keys from Craig and laughed. "Yes—me with a key."

Craig nodded, trying to just accept his weirdness now, and spoke in a lower tone, as if telling a secret. "And listen, Mark and I, we had an arrangement where if you ever need me out of your hair, just give me a shout, okay?"

Craig winked at the Doctor, and the Doctor winked back, only pretending to understand what was going on before asking, "Why would I want that?"

"In case you want to bring someone round—"

"Right!" The Doctor interrupted, immediately thinking of someone. "By the way, something you should know. There's a woman called Nova, she's usually with me but she's at home right now sorting out some... family problems, and I don't know if she'll be back soon or not." The Doctor explained.

"Oh, everything alright, mate?" Craig picked up on the Doctor's worried tone.

"Yeah, yeah," The Doctor quickly changed his demeanor. "I just thought I should let you know she might come around some time."

"Okay, well you might want to tell her to bring a pillow—cause there's only one on the bed right now," Craig informed him.

"Oh, it's okay, we don't sleep much." The Doctor assured him, smiling gently.

Craig cringed just a little. "Didn't need to know that, mate."

The Doctor assumed he was right, but wasn't sure why. "By the way, that rot," The Doctor looked to the rot that was slowly growing across the ceiling. "I've got the strangest feeling that we shouldn't touch it."

**888**

" _Why_ does the universe hate me so much?" I asked, holding my head in pain, noticing that once again I landed on the floor when there was a perfectly good bed next to me that I could have landed on instead.

"Nova! I didn't know if you would make it here," The Doctor kneeled beside me and helped me stand up.

I waited a few moments for the pain to subside before responding. "Yeah, I just wanted to make sure..."

I stopped, still not able to speak a sentence all the way through with the pain in my head, so the Doctor continued. "Make sure of what?"

"That my phone would work..." I replied sheepishly, before looking around at our oddly normal surroundings. "And where exactly are we?"

"My room! In Essex, in the flat of a man named Craig," the Doctor told me excitedly.

"IS THAT NOVA?" I heard a familiar shriek from the Doctor's ear.

"OW!" The Doctor held a hand up to his ear. "Not so loud! Yes, it's her," the Doctor took out the earpiece from his ear and gave it to me.

I looked down at the strange blinking device and then back up at him, not knowing what to do with it. He grabbed it from my hand and moved my hair back, putting it in my ear himself. I only had a brief moment to think about the sensation of his fingertips brushing my hair behind my ear until I giggled a little. "That tickles..."

"Nova?" Amy asked from the earpiece.

"Yeah, hey! What did I miss?" I smiled. I really did miss Amy while I was gone.

"Well, there's a Van Gogh painting dedicated to me now," Amy said nonchalantly.

I grinned. "That's so cool! It's technically always been dedicated to you."

"Yeah, I know! Listen—the Doctor told me what happened, I know you have to be... _over_ _there,_ but do you think you can still help him sort out whatever's going on? I'm stuck in a raging, manic TARDIS here."

"Of course, I'll do what I can!" I glanced to see that the Doctor was now poking around at some miscellaneous items on a dresser, and spoke quietly— "Also, we should do Nora Ephron for our next director marathon."

"Ooh, deal!" Amy chirped excitedly.

I gave the earpiece back to the Doctor, tapping him on the shoulder with it, and he squinted back at me. "Director marathon?"

"Girls only," I plopped back down on the bed to try and calm what was left of my trans-universal headache as he continued pacing around and talking to Amy.

"Now, all I've got to do is pass as an ordinary human being. Simple. What could possibly go wrong?" The Doctor chattered away.

"I'm going to ban you from saying that," I groaned. Every time that line was said, something always went wrong.

The Doctor only raised his eyebrows at me mischievously, before continuing on with Amy. "Bow ties are cool. Come on, Amy, I'm a normal bloke. Tell me what normal blokes do... Fine." The Doctor turned back to me. "Nova, what do normal blokes do?"

I sat up. "Well, first of all—how did you pay your rent?" I asked, genuinely curious.

"Soniced the nearest ATM— works every time."

"And then?"

"Put the money in a bag, gave it to Craig."

"Cash? In a bag? Well, he definitely thinks you're a drug dealer—so maybe that will help subside whatever doesn't pass as normal." I shrugged.

The Doctor sneered at me playfully, and paid attention to Amy in his earpiece again. "I could do those things. I don't, but I could."

Some banging upstairs interrupted, and I jolted, remembering what was going to happen for the first time since I landed here.

"Hang on, wait, wait, wait—Amy?" The Doctor asked, putting down the items he was poking around at on the shelves, looking up to the ceiling where the noise had come from.

I stood up, seeing that the clocks around the room were spinning forwards and backwards rapidly. I walked up to the Doctor and grabbed his left arm, holding it up and moving back his sleeve to look at his watch on the inside of his wrist, noticing that it was moving back and forth also. "Ooh, time distortion."

"Localized time loop," the Doctor continued for me, sitting down on the bed. "Amy—whatever's happening upstairs is still affecting you... My end's good. No, no, no, not really. Just keep the zigzag plotter on full!"

"Um... Doctor, I'm going back to 51 now, but I'll try to come back as soon as possible," I said softly, holding my locket in my hand, knowing he was busy enough over here.

The Doctor seemed caught off-guard by my statement. He stood up again, but seemed hesitant to approach me. "Well, I'll see you soon, then."

I nodded, and smiled after a moment. "Yeah, see you soon."

**888**

I quickly shuffled next to Dylan on the court bench, not many people noticing my entrance. There were many others moving in and out at a constant rate, but I still spoke in hushed tones. "What did I miss?"

He leaned over to me, whispering towards me. "Pretty much just the boring stuff. Now they're about to reveal another director."

" _Emergency_ director," I shuddered. "Do you think the revealing rumors are true?"

"Definitely, at least for emergency courts. They always try to say they choose which director to reveal next at random, but everyone thinks they've had to have messed up somehow." Dylan muttered.

I moved my head up and around, trying to get a good angle to see the very front row of people. There were eleven people sitting next to each other in black cloaks there. Those people were the directors, and one of them was about to be revealed.

"If the appointed director could step forward," the judge asked. One of the cloaked figures stood up, and approached the judge cautiously. "And please remove your hood."

Slowly, the figure brought up their black leather gloved hands, and pushed their hood back, revealing a mass of brown curls.

"That's.... Is that...?" I asked Dylan, hardly believing what I was seeing, but simultaneously looking back to certain things that had happened, and piecing them all together. I didn't want it to—but it made perfect sense.

"Please face the jury, and answer any following statements and questions that may arise to you throughout the session," The judge ordered. "State your name."

The person turned, revealing themselves and proving my recently developed hypothesis correct. "Sally Jones," She echoed, staring straight ahead, not daring to look at anyone.

"Your recommended demotion is Assistant to Head of Division 3, Zodiac. Do you accept, or keep your pretense of Manager of Transfers?" The judge read from a paper, reading out Sally's new job options since she was no longer a director.

Sally gulped, but her face was carefully emotionless. "I keep my pretense."

"Thank you, you are dismissed for the present moment."

Sally stepped down and sat a row behind her old seat, still holding herself as powerfully as the people sitting in front of her. I stared at the back of her head, choosing to believe that what she told me before was true quicker than I expected. After all, even though she was a widely liked person—now that she was revealed as a director, she definitely earned herself new enemies.

However, I took this as an opportunity.

"Scarlette? Are you okay?" Dylan asked, noticing my new expression.

Sally being my father's girlfriend was a well-known fact, so it would have been easy to leave, and everyone would assume I would be shaken by her reveal since no one exactly knew how close we were.

I nodded and waved my phone at him, signaling that he should text me when something comes up, and walked out of the courtroom, and back to the other universe.


	30. The Lodger (pt 2) / Court (pt 2)

When I arrived, I was able to notice that I was in the spare room the Doctor was currently occupying in Craig's house, and that it was currently empty.

Even though I knew what should happen, I was too delirious to think straight enough—and only thought about the fact that something must be off if I was far from the Doctor when I landed. My worries were not assuaged at all when I heard a strange jumble of noises coming from outside, not being able to sort them out through the piercing in my brain.

"Doctor?" I asked, my voice strained, stumbling out of the room and into a hallway I was unfamiliar with.

I had closed my eyes at this point, the light streaming from the outside possibly making my symptoms worse—but it wasn't long before I felt slightly wet hands on my face. "Nova? Are you alright?"

The only noise I could get out was—"Um," before covering my eyes with my hands, decided that just closing them wasn't enough. "Lights."

The Doctor took it upon himself to hug me, bringing me in to his chest so the light was further blocked from me. Blocking the light must have helped a lot more than I thought, because I was able to come back to my senses enough to notice that the Doctor's chest was bare and damp, and pulled away blushing only after a few moments.

I was finally able to take in my surroundings properly. "Um, hi," I waved, smiling shyly, noticing Craig coming down the staircase very slowly—taking his time to stare at the peculiar sight before him—which would be a shirtless Doctor in only a towel hugging a well-dressed girl he didn't know.

"Oh, hello—I'm... Craig." He approached me slowly, stretching out his hand to me.

"Nova," I smiled again, shaking his hand back. "Sorry, I just got here and, um... I get really bad migraines and faint from them sometimes, so..." I stumbled, making up an excuse for the awkward sight.

"Oh, no, it's no problem! Was just wondering what... that was all about." Craig chuckled nervously. "Nova, right—The Doctor said you might be coming."

"He did?" I asked, looking to the Doctor.

"I did," the Doctor confirmed, before stepping over to the staircase, and holding Craig's toothbrush up to it. "But that's not important now—what happened, did you speak to the man upstairs?"

"Yeah," Craig confirmed. "Is that my toothbrush?"

The Doctor was about to interrogate further, when the sound of Craig's phone ringing interrupted from the kitchen.

When Craig left to answer it, I took the toothbrush from the Doctor's hand, walked over to the restroom, and swapped it for the sonic screwdriver in the toothbrush holder. I closed the door and held it out to him. "I hope you know that from now on I am only referring to this as your toothbrush."

"What, to go with the evil saltshakers?" The Doctor teased, reminding me of the first time I met the daleks and called them saltshakers. He took his sonic from me.

"I can't believe you remember that," I giggled, before slowly starting up the stairs. "So what's up there?"

We were interrupted further speculation of the second floor again, when this time the front door opened.

"Oh, uh, hello!" A friendly voice chirped, revealing Sophie carrying the mail and some milk.

"Ah! Hello, the Doctor!"

Sophie didn't do a very good job of hiding how she looked the Doctor up and down—but to be fair, he didn't notice, and was only wearing a towel. She only managed a small—"Right."

"You must be Sophie," The Doctor gently placed a hand on her shoulder and moved to air-kiss her cheeks. I was reminded of my Puerto Rican family I had known for a short period of time in the way he greeted her—but knew that this was definitely not a typical British greeting with how confused Sophie seemed.

The Doctor walked into the kitchen where Craig was, so I took the opportunity to introduce myself. "Hi, I'm Nova. I don't do the kissing thing," I held out my hand.

"Oh, that's just fine," She shook my hand and laughed. She peered into the kitchen to see the Doctor talking with Craig. "You two are...?"

"Friends!" I finished the sentence for her, smiling.

"Oh. Well, I like the dress," Sophie motioned to my outfit.

"Thanks, it has pockets!" I demonstrated, taking my phone out.

"How nice! A rarity," Sophie nodded, and walked into the kitchen to put the mail down and tidy up some things.

I caught the end of the Doctor and Craig's conversation, knowing he just agreed to play football, or what I called soccer. "You've saved my life. I've got somebody. Yeah, all right, I'll see you down there," Craig hung up his cell phone. "Hey, Soph."

"Hey, I thought I'd come early and meet your new flat mate."

The Doctor walked over to get milk from the fridge and started drinking it out of the carton. "Do you play, Sophie?"

Sophie only laughed, not expecting for the Doctor to be serious about the question, but Craig quickly recognized that he was. "No, Soph just stands on the sidelines. She's my mascot."

Sophie quickly made a disapproving face. "I'm your mascot? Mascot?"

Craig began stuttering. "Well, yeah, not my mascot. It's a football match. I can't take a date."

I looked to the Doctor, and we both gave each other a subtle look, knowing what was going on here.

"I didn't say I was your date," Sophie pointed out.

"Neither did I," Craig recovered quickly.

There was a moment of silence before the Doctor figured, "Better get dressed."

"No kidding," I added under my breath.

"The spare kit's just in the bottom drawer!" Craig called after the Doctor as he walked out of the room.

"Bit of a mess," The Doctor commented.

"Of course," I added again.

As soon as the Doctor shut the door, Craig asked Sophie—"What do you think?"

Sophie gave me a brief look of caution before giving in and smiling, "You didn't say he was _gorgeous_!"

I smiled just a little at her, signaling that nothing was going on and it was all good, but I couldn't help but falter slightly. I didn't really think much about the fact that other people also found the Doctor attractive, and for some reason it was bothering me.

But the bothering feeling didn't last long, because I noticed how Craig's face fell, and the Doctor stuck his head back through the door. "You unlocked the door. How did you do that? Those are your keys. You must have left them last time you came here."

I sighed and looked up at the ceiling. Interrogating people like that was just such a _normal human thing_ that people did. The Doctor was _really_ coming off as a normal human being already.

Despite the awkward question, Sophie still felt the need to defend herself. "Yeah, but I—How do you know these are my keys?"

"I've been holding them," Craig embarrassingly admitted.

"I have got another set," Sophie held up the other set of keys she got into the house with, which didn't have a fluffy pink ball on them... that sort of reminded me of Meredith.

"You've got two sets of keys to someone else's house?" The Doctor asked.

"Yeah?"

"I see... You must like it here too," the Doctor closed the door, and I rolled my eyes at his strange antics, only allowing myself to be so distracted as I felt my phone vibrate.

**888**

"Anything?" I asked.

"Her sentence if she's guilty," Dylan whispered to me.

I gulped. In all honesty, I wasn't completely sure how the normal American judiciary system worked, because I only ever had to take science courses in college while I was there, and never went past basic government in high school. There were some major differences, however.

For example, there were no lawyers in Area 51. You got a sentence, and you were either guilty, or you weren't. The jury was also not just a small selection of people—but the entire working population of Area 51 was able to come in and vote, which was why people were constantly filtering in and out.

"Life in sector 8 of Thatcher," Were the only words from the Judge's long, exhausting, professional soliloquy that I understood—but it was enough.

Thatcher was a classified women's prison. Sector 8 was specific to Area 51, so it wasn't normal or as rigorous. Even in lifetime-classified prison, we weren't allowed to be regular.

I started hyperventilating at the idea of Meredith in a prison somewhere for the rest of her life—even if it was a moderately comfortable Area 51 version.

"Hey, breathe," Dylan rested his hand on my thigh.

I suddenly felt the overwhelming need to go outside.

**888**

****When Doctor Who was simply a show for me—it was easily an escape. Now that it's a world that I'm a part of, however—it was just an extension of real life. When I stood beside Sophie as she cheered, the outdoors helped, but the noise didn't—and I still felt the overwhelming urge to cry.

Thankfully, it went away rather quickly, when Sophie began screaming and jumping up and down in excitement, turning to me and urging me to jump up and down with her.

Immediately, I smiled and clapped. The Doctor had scored one of many, many goals. The incident with Meredith didn't disappear, but it was able to hide somewhere in the back of my mind, long enough for me to act normal. Using my locket was always a huge environmental change in many more ways than one, and in trying times like this, it was a little more difficult to adapt.

Thankfully, it was easy to laugh at how lanky and fumbling the Doctor was on a football field.

**888**

"You are _so_ on the team!" One of Craig's friends, and the Doctor's apparent new teammate smiled. "Next week we've got the Crown and Anchor. We're going to _annihilate_ them."

 **"** Annihilate?" The Doctor started, but I interrupted before he could launch into a definitely-not-normal speech about being the oncoming storm against violence or something.

"Yeah, you're definitely going to beat them at that match!" I smiled.

"Right," The Doctor nodded at me. "Lovely. What sort of time?"

Craig opened a can of beer, and got sprayed with foam—everyone laughing and reacting joyfully.

Then, Craig opened a can of beer, and got sprayed with foam—everyone laughing and reacting joyfully. Over, and over, and over, in a short, second-long time loop that only the Doctor and I were unaffected by.

The Doctor walked a few paces away from the repeating crowd, and began speaking into his earpiece. "Amy?"

Once again, I could only hear one half of this conversation. "What does the scanner say?" I tried to motion for the Doctor to let me talk to her, making phoning motions, but he only made confused faces at me as he continued trying to calm Amy. "Yes, yes, it's, it's good. Zigzag plotter. Zigzag—"

"Oh, for the love of god," I got up on my tiptoes, and spoke into the Doctor's earpiece. "Amy, can you hear me? There's this weird, orange glowy knob, just twist it to the right!"

I pressed my ear against the Doctor's and could hear what Amy was saying. "The orange? Okay—oh!"

"Amy?" The Doctor asked.

"It's calm now!"

"Oh, thank heavens. I thought for a moment the TARDIS had been flung off into the vortex with you inside it, lost forever," The Doctor sighed.

"What, you mean that could actually happen? You have _got_ to get me out of here!" Amy panicked on the other line.

"How are the numbers?" The Doctor asked again, and I got tired of standing on my tiptoes and pulled away.

"Fives? Even better. Still, it means the effect's almost unbelievably powerful and dangerous, but don't worry. Hang on, okay? I've got some rewiring to do." The Doctor explained.

Time returned to normal, and I looked around, crossing my arms. My phone vibrated, and I took it out to read the message.

_From: dylan ismael_

_Voting count in guilty. She has to come out and plead now._

I sighed as I clicked the message closed and put the phone back in my dress pocket.

"You knew how to stabilize the TARDIS faster," the Doctor commented. Some things, such as the inner mechanisms of a TARDIS, slowly came back to me rather than through flashbacks like my other memories. I assumed that operating a TARDIS was like riding a bike in that way.

"And you managed to get inter-universe communication on your phone." The Doctor added.

"I know how stuff works," I shrugged, before sighing, not forgetting the contents of the message for a second. "And I also have to go."

"You know, you should consider slowing down a little... inter-universe travel affects you too much." The Doctor suggested quietly.

"I'll be fine," I smiled sadly. "I have to do this."

The Doctor nodded.

**888**

"Did you get my text?" Dylan asked me, as I sat down beside him again.

"Yeah," I whispered, not bothering to say anything else, and not wanting to. I knew what was going to happen next.

My eyes were glued to the right side of the room, where Meredith stood. She was wearing her normal clothes, frilly, flowery, and light—and I couldn't help but think that this was the last time I would ever see her, so I didn't care if I was staring.

I was staring so much—trying so hard to burn her image into my memory—that I barely caught what the judge was saying—something about how she was going to plead.

And then came the last word I ever heard out of Meredith's mouth.

"Guilty."


	31. The Lodger (pt 3)

When you are close to unconsciousness, it's hard to piece together coherent thoughts in your brain and accurately take in your surroundings—but I was conscious enough upon pressing the locket again to hypothesize that either the fact that I had travelled back and forth so much within such a short period of time was making my side effects worse—or that they were gradually becoming worse over time, the more I used it.

Or both.

Either way—it took me a few moments to register the fact that someone was holding me, and calling my name softly, and I had no idea if it had been seconds or minutes.

It was as though at first the pain was so much that I forgot it was there completely—like I was simply too weak to feel it enough. But eventually, my strength returned, and a dull dread in my head turned into a loud piercing. I realized that I was gripping the Doctor's shirt—and my grip was weak at first, but growing stronger as I came to my senses. My eyes were still shut tight.

The piercing faded away, and I was finally able to understand what the Doctor was saying.

"Nova... can you hear me?"

I sucked in a deep breath, and whispered. "Yeah."

"Why are you crying?"

I opened my eyes and looked up at him, stepping away from him and releasing his shirt—realizing that it was also tear-stained, along with my face. "Well..." I stumbled back a little more, before something touched me from behind. I turned to see a broom was poking my back—which was sticking out of a strange contraption attached to a lamp shade, bike, umbrella, shopping cart—and many other strange, domestic objects—with wires running through it all. "What is _this_?"

The Doctor didn't respond as he normally would—only continued staring at me as though I were about to collapse again.

"Um..." I decided to begin guessing if he wasn't going to give me answers. "A scanner for interlocks th—"

"Nova," the Doctor called to me again in a low voice, stepping closer to me, still giving me the same look.

I rubbed a hand over my face and sighed, sitting down on the mattress that was on the floor, and the Doctor sat next to me. "Meredith pleaded guilty. And I mean... I knew she was, but... I still can't believe it. She's been one of my only friends for _years_ , and one of the best friends I've ever had and... I don't want to believe that I never really knew her."

"You _did_ know her." The Doctor assured me.

"No I didn't... It's been 6 years of friendship and I never even knew she had a sister!" My voice cracked, the tears that had calmed down only a few seconds ago threatening to fall again.

"Her sister was a part of who she was before she met you. The Meredith that you knew was the Meredith that she wanted to be for you. You knew her as she wanted you to, as she was in that moment—and really, that matters more than whoever she may have been before." The Doctor moved closer to me, rubbing my back and leaning his head on top of mine as I leaned on his shoulder.

The Doctor's speech was comforting—but for some reason, it had me reflecting more on myself towards the end, and I wondered if that was the same thought process that got him to stop being mad at me and accept me again.

"Time Lords need to sleep too. Especially with the after-effects of inter-universe time traveling, and time being longer for you because of it." The Doctor told me after I yawned.

"Do you know what the effects are? And why?" I yawned again, wondering why I never bothered to ask in the first place.

"Not... really," the Doctor admitted. "But I know they're not good—and too much is dangerous."

I nodded, and stopped struggling to keep my eyes open. I laid down on the mattress and turned on my side, beginning to drift to sleep.

**888**

The Doctor built a huge, noisy non-technological scanner using technology adapted from Lamasteen. A big, bright, noisy piece of machinery made out of household items like lampshades and bicycles rotated oars and rakes, and to the Doctor's surprise—Nova still hadn't woken up. He took a mental note of the fact that she was a heavy sleeper, and kept talking to Amy.

"No, no, it can't be. It's too normal!" The Doctor stepped over to the contraption, wiring and re-wiring as he tried to make sense of the contradicting readings.

"Well, didn't you say Nova was back? What does _she_ think? Lost in space—remember!" Amy complained.

"Nova's asleep." The Doctor stated simply, continuing to work.

" _Asleep_?" Amy asked incredulously—only ever recalling one incident of Nova actually sleeping in the TARDIS, and somewhat offended that she wasn't up and helping rescue her.

"Yes—Time Lords need to sleep sometimes, especially inter-universe-travelling ones."

"Doctor..." Amy trailed. "Do you trust her?"

The Doctor was slightly taken aback by the sudden change of subject, and looked at Nova's peaceful, sleeping form on the mattress, which he had put a fuzzy blanket over. He sighed. "I probably shouldn't. But I do."

"Why?" Amy always asked the hard questions.

"Probably because she's the only other Time Lord in existence. I want to believe I can trust her." The Doctor tried to dismiss her.

"But would you really trust any other Time Lord like that? Come on, Doctor. What is it?"

There was a long moment of silence. "I don't know."

Amy didn't know what her answer would be, either.

**888**

I awoke to a sight I never thought I would ever see in my life, in any universe: breakfast in bed, with a note attached that read ' _off to work :)_ _'._

I ate the breakfast and was only able to contemplate and enjoy the awkward domesticity of it all for a few minutes when Craig came bursting into the room. "Nova! Where did the Doctor go?" He breathed heavily, haphazardly dressed in a business-casual suit.

"Um, to work, apparently." I replied, holding up the paper the Doctor had left on the breakfast tray.

"Well... I'm going to work too." Craig stated, dashing off.

I got up as quickly as I could, taking one last piece of toast with me as I chased Craig down the hallway. "Wait!" Craig turned to me—somewhat frustrated, but I knew I had to ask. I knew where the Doctor would be, and wasn't about to wait around here. "Can I go with you?"

**888**

Craig had run off before me, and I wasn't going to run up three flights of stairs if I didn't have to. Besides, I figured I would have to save my energy. There was always some occasion for running with the Doctor around.

I stepped into the office as if I knew what I was doing, and thankfully, the desk where the Doctor sat was in clear line of sight.

"Nova! You look much better," The Doctor smiled brightly.

"And you look super weird," I sat in the chair across the Doctor's desk, not getting any more adjusted to the sight of the Doctor having a desk and wearing a headset as time went by. "Working in an office? It just doesn't look right."

"I was curious. Never worked in an office before." The Doctor grabbed a strange device that had a spatula spinning around on top of it, and gave it to me to see if I could work on the readings and fix them while I stole some of his cookies.

**888**

" _What_ the hell is that?!" Craig exclaimed, upon opening the door to the Doctor's temporary room and noticing the giant, odd machine creaking through the middle of it.

I had been waiting in the room while the Doctor talked to his apparent "spy" (cat), trying to mess enough with the device so that it showed the surplus of energy that I _knew_ was coming from the false second floor, and possibly speed things up again. However—I couldn't tell any of that to Craig.

"It's art!" I smiled nervously, stepping back from the thing. "A statement."

Craig shook his head and left the room, and I thought my excuse had honestly worked—until Craig opened the door to the room again, the Doctor hurrying in behind him.

"...And then, there's _that!"_ Craig gestured to the spinning contraption.

The Doctor rushed in front of him, moving over to grab an oar and stop everything from turning. "It's art! A statement on modern society! Ooh, ain't modern society awful? Tell him, Nova."

"Me and you, and also you," Craig pointed at me, "It's not going to work out. You've only been here three days. These have been the three weirdest days of my life!"

"Your days will get a lot weirder if we go," The Doctor insisted, hovering over him.

"I thought it was good weirdness—it's not, it's bad weird! I can't do this any more!" Craig protested.

"We can't leave here, Craig. I promise we'll stay out of your way—but we _need_ to stay here," I tried to sound convincing and inconspicuous at the same time.

"No, you don't. You have to leave!"

"We can't go," The Doctor insisted.

"Just GET _OUT_!"

The Doctor quickly grabbed Craig by the lapels of his suit before he could do anything else. "Right. Only way. I'm going to show you something, but shush. Really, shush. Oh, I am going to regret this."

"Doctor... are you sure?" I asked knowing what he was about to do.

"Not really. Okay, right. First, general background," The Doctor yanked Craig in so that their foreheads slammed together. Both of the men immediately held their foreheads and yelped in pain, and it was strange watching it all—both cringing at the noise of their foreheads crashing, and trying not to laugh at it.

However, after only a few seconds of moaning, Craig either recovered—or was too awestruck to care about the pain anymore, and gasped widely while pointing at the Doctor. "You're a...!"

The Doctor was still shouting "OW!" And had a hand over his forehead, pushing his back against the wall.

"Yes," The Doctor breathed.

"From—!"

I placed a hand on Craig's shoulder, trying to calm him down so the Doctor could prepare for the next round. "Shh, Craig, breathe..."

Craig turned to me with the same awestruck expression. "And you... you..."

"I what?" I didn't expect for Craig to find something about me in the 'general background' section of the Doctor's head.

"Craig, Shh!" The Doctor grabbed his collar again, still trying to recover his breath. "Right. Okay—specific detail," The Doctor crashed his head with Craig's again. I flinched backwards at how loud their screams were.

Craig gasped frantically again, pointing at the Doctor. "You—you saw my ad in the paper shop window!"

"Yes, with this right above it. Which is odd, because Amy hasn't written it yet." The Doctor heaved, pulling out the note. "Time travel. It _can_ happen."

Craig pointed at me. "And—and you kept leaving to another universe! To... To—"

"Yep!" I interrupted, trying to speak more softly and hoping that Craig would match my tone—now being able to know that this process caused the Doctor a great deal more of pain than it did to him. "No more talking now, just... Shh..."

" _Thank_ you!" The Doctor panted.

**888**

"Please, can you help me?" A silhouette of a little girl echoed from the top of the staircase, a doll dangling in her hand.

"Hi," Sophie stepped over to the staircase, trying to get a closer glimpse.

"Please. Will you help me?" The girl spoke in the same exact tone.

"What's the matter, my love?" Sophie trekked up the stairs slowly, following the girl inside. "Help you?"

**888**

"I am never, _never_ doing that ever, _ever_ again." The Doctor sat down, activating his earpiece again. "Amy—"

"That's Amy Pond!" Craig covered his mouth in shock.

"Oh, of course, you can understand us now. Hurrah," The Doctor groaned sarcastically, still not over the headache, and spoke to Amy. "Got those plans yet? I've worked it out, with psychic help from a cat..."

Craig gave me a bewildered look, in shock at his own understanding, and I could only shrug and smile.

"Yes. I know he's got a time engine in the flat upstairs. He's using innocent people to try and launch it. Whenever he does, they get burnt up, hence the stain on your ceiling," The Doctor pointed to Craig.

"From the ceiling!" Craig pointed up frantically.

"Well done, Craig. And you, Miss Pond, nearly get thrown off into the Vortex." The Doctor figured it out.

A loud thud resounded from above, and we all looked up. Craig panicked with realization. "People are dying up there!" And then, he panicked over and over, not finishing his sentence, looping back to the beginning. "People are dying! People are dying! People are dying!"

"Amy..." The Doctor called.

"Someone's up there right now!" I declared, knowing it was Sophie—and running ahead, the Doctor and Craig following.

Despite the head start, Craig and the Doctor had paused on the staircase. "Craig, come on. Someone's dying up there..." The Doctor trailed, noticing Craig was staring in fear at the pink fluffy keychain attached to the door that never opened—keys that belonged to Sophie... and reminded me of Meredith.

Craig panicked, and ran up the stairs faster. " _Sophie_. It's Sophie that's dying up there! It's Sophie!"

The Doctor stopped us at the door, and I huffed in annoyance, my head start being wasted anyway. "Wait, wait—Amy? Just going in. Of course I can be upstairs."

"There is no upstairs!" Amy shouted loud enough for both Craig and I to hear.

The Doctor soniced the door open, and we stepped in, confused by the sight before us—a giant room with a big, black spaceship inside. " _What?_ " Craig marveled.

"Oh... of course!" The Doctor walked further inside, Craig following, while I looked around on my own. "The time engine isn't in the flat, the time engine _is_ the flat. Someone's attempt to build a TARDIS."

"No, there's _always_ been an upstairs!" Craig said vehemently.

"Has there? Think about it."

"Yes... No! I don't—"

"Perception filter. It's more than a disguise. It tricks your memory."

Suddenly, a familiar female scream reverberated throughout the space. 

"Sophie!" Craig immediately recognized her voice—and only a few moments later, Sophie emerged from the shadows, being pulled in through electricity by her hand to a panel with a white, glowing sphere in the center console of the ship. "Sophie! Oh, my God, Sophie!" Craig ran over and tried pulling her wrist back.

"Craig!" Sophie shouted.

I tried to pull her wrist back too, and the Doctor ran over with his sonic. "It's controlling her. It's willing her to touch the activator!"

"NO! It's not going to have her!" Craig shouted.

Sophie's hand touched the orb, and the Doctor struggled with the sonic around it. "Agh, deadlock seal!

"You've got to do something!" Craig shouted again, and Sophie was released—falling back as Craig held her on the ground.

"That's not right," I stood up, knowing what was supposed to happen next.

"What? Why's it let her go?" The Doctor worried.

A hologram of an old man appeared, and the Doctor and I walked up to it. "You will help me."

"Right! Stop! Crashed ship, let's see," The Doctor began trying a protocol. "Hello, I'm Captain Troy Handsome of International Rescue. Please state the nature of your emergency."

"The ship has crashed. The crew are dead. A pilot is required." The autopilot droned on.

"You're the emergency crash program. A hologram. What, you've been luring people up here so you can try them out?" The Doctor glared, and held his sonic up to the hologram, disgusted at what it's been doing.

When the sonic whirred, the hologram flickered between different people—a young girl, old man, young man—all repeating, "You will help me."

"Craig, what is this? Where am I?" Sophie asked nervously, and Craig continued holding her and comforting her.

"Hush," The Doctor said to them, needing to work. "Human brains aren't strong enough, they just burn; But you're _stupid_ , aren't you? You just keep trying." The Doctor insulted the machine.

"Seventeen people have been tried. Six billion four hundred thousand and twenty six remain." The old voice droned again.

Sophie stood up. "Seriously, what is going on."

"The second floor of Craig's building is actually a spaceship trying to kill everyone on the planet, please be quiet!" I rushed, while the Doctor and the autopilot continued, not being able to help the feeling that I was speaking to Meredith again, because Sophie reminded me so much of her. I was in an entirely different world in a high-stakes situation—but I still hadn't been able to process my grief, and all I could think about was that I would give anything to be able to go back and see her again.

"The correct pilot has now been found," the autopilot declared.

"Yes, I was a bit worried that you were going to say that," the Doctor said pointedly, still sounding more angry than worried.

"Ow— _what?!"_ A pain surged through my chest, electricity prickling and pulling me toward another glowing orb, and I latched on to a metal pole beside me, trying not to get sucked in.

"Why is it choosing _me?!"_ I was thrown so off-guard by this, and didn't even think of this possibility. I immediately came up with theories: because the old pilot was a woman and it would rather have a woman, because I'm a Time Lord like the Doctor but not traveled enough to destroy the machine like he would.

Because... this machine fed on people who had the desire to leave, and I wanted to go the farthest—not just to another location in time and space like the Doctor, but to an entirely different universe—where my best friends were.

"NOVA!" The Doctor hugged me from around my waist, trying to pull me back, as I struggled to find a reason to want to stay in this place. "No, she's way too much for this ship. Her hand touches that panel, the planet doesn't blow up, the whole solar system does!" The Doctor explained to Amy in his earpiece.

"The correct pilot has been found," The machine echoed again.

"No— _please_ stop, this is NOT A GOOD IDEA!" I shouted, digging my feet into the ground as much as I could.

"It doesn't want everyone. Craig, it didn't want you!" The Doctor scrambled to find a solution.

I wasn't going to try to do anything before—but now that the machine had surged me forward so that my hand was just inches away from touching the panel, I knew I had to say something. "AGH! Doctor, I know how this thing works! It didn't want Sophie before but now it does because she wants to go to London, and it wants me because I want to go to another universe!"

"Of course! I gave her the idea of leaving. It's a machine that needs to leave! It wants people who want to escape. And you don't want to leave, Craig. You're Mister Sofa Man!" The Doctor yelled at him, still trying to hold me back.

I thought long and hard about why I would want to stay, and for the first time, let myself think of the totally impossible.

I thought of the breakfast the Doctor made for me this morning, of sharing the same room with him in a house—and what it would be like to have that every day. It wasn't hard to make myself long for it—I always craved some semblance of normalcy at Area 51.

I didn't ever have to come back here between the trials—it was dangerous and painful, but I did anyway, and I finally reveled in the reason why: because I made a promise. I just needed to remind myself of how much that promise meant to me.

"Doctor, hold my hand!" I shouted.

"What—why!" The Doctor ask-shouted back.

"Just _DO IT!"_ I roared.

When the Doctor slapped his hand onto mine—the bond to the machine wasn't completely broken, but it was definitely weakened—and we stumbled a few paces back. Electricity streamed from both of our hands now, and we adjusted our hands so our fingers were intertwined and grasping each other tight, trying our hardest to pull away, the Doctor far enough back to hold on to the pole now.

Part of it worked—I wanted to stay with the Doctor, and perhaps he wanted to stay with me, too. But while we may have wanted to stay together, we still didn't want to stay _here_.

"Craig, you can shut down the engine. Put your hand on the panel and concentrate on why you want to stay!" The Doctor's voice cracked, both of our bodies shaking and weakening from the force of trying to pull away from the ship.

"Craig, DON'T!" Sophie cried, her voice gravelling.

"Will it work?" Craig asked.

"It will! IT WILL! IT HAS TO!" I shouted, biting down hard on my lip to try and concentrate on pulling away from the pain, and knowing that the convincing time for this had to be shorter. Who knows what was different now, or how much time was left?

"Good enough for me," Craig took a deep breath before slamming his hand on the orb. "GERONIMO!"

The Doctor and I were immediately released, and I stumbled back just a little, but the Doctor held me steady—still hanging on to the pole. He quickly grabbed my face and brushed his lips over my forehead for just a millisecond before rushing over to Craig and shouting at him. "Craig, what's keeping you here? Think about everything that makes you want to stay here! Why don't you want to leave?" The Doctor slapped him.

Craig screamed from both the force of the slap, and the smoke that was beginning to emit from his hand. "SOPHIE! I don't want to leave Sophie. I can't leave Sophie! I LOVE SOPHIE!"

The Doctor was grinning like an idiot now and moved away as Sophie gasped.

"I love you, too, Craig, you idiot!" Sophie slammed her hand right on top of Craig's—and the ship's mechanisms seemed to falter.

"Honestly, do you mean that?" Craig stuttered.

"Of course I mean it—do you mean it?"

"I've always meant it. Seriously though, do you mean it?"

"Yes!" Sophie giggled.

I glared at them, still trying to catch my breath. "Okay, seriously?"

"What about the monkeys?" Craig asked.

Now it was the Doctor's turn to be annoyed. "Oh, not now, not again; Craig, the planet's about to burn. For God's sake, KISS THE GIRL!"

As Sophie and Craig kissed, their hands slipped off the panel with ease, moving to hold each other as they continued.

I laughed. "It worked!"

The Doctor glanced around, looking up at the ship and listening to Amy before replying—"Big no,"

The ship began shaking, the hologram flickering quickly and saying, "Help me!" over and over, smoke growing and lights beaming faster.

"Did we switch it off?" Craig asked, only just then moving to breathe.

"It's an emergency shutdown!" I figured.

"It's imploding," The Doctor continued. "Everybody out, out, out!"

Craig and Sophie ran out the door, down the stairs, and out of the house, the Doctor and I following.

We turned around to see the top level of the house pixelate into a Timeship, and then pixelate into nothing, a man and his child walking by on the street as if nothing had happened.

"Look at them. Didn't they see that? The whole top floor just vanished," Craig asked.

"Perception filter." The Doctor explained. "There never was a top floor."

**888**

After we said goodbye to Craig and Sophie, Amy went to sleep-- but the Doctor and I were already well-rested.

"Nova..." The Doctor began slowly, and I stopped poking around at the TARDIS controls (my new favorite thing to do). "Why did you ask me to hold your hand?"

I took a deep breath. I held his hand to remind myself of a promise I made, and since it nearly saved our lives, I knew I would have to admit the truth. "Do you remember the night in the Starship UK, when I first held your hand?"

"Of course."

"Do you remember what I said to you?"

"That... I'm not alone anymore."

"Yes." I walked over to where the orb was held in a circular cup-holder like plastic, and stared at it. "Because I'll stay with you."

I didn't ever have to come back here between the trials—it was dangerous and painful, but I did anyway, and I finally reveled in the reason why when I needed to find a reason to stay: because I didn't want to leave the Doctor alone. I made him a promise that first night I held his hand on the Starship UK—that he wasn't alone anymore, because I wouldn't let him be.

"Thank you." I heard the Doctor gulp as he came up next to me, and he placed his hand on the orb, almost caressing it, and giving me a mischievous look. "So—do you want to know what this thing does?"

"Yes," I said a little too quickly, and we both chuckled a little at my response.

The Doctor began pacing around—in explaining mode. "This is a Globe of the Sisterhood of Karn. It was given to Time Lords in the days of Omega as a gift. The story goes—that these have powers in them, but very specific powers: such as the ability to speak a particular dead language, or know all the codes to a particular machine, or even revive a certain person. Usually there are two powers in each globe that go together to achieve the main goal."

"How does that work?" I asked.

"The first power is activated by simply touching the outer layer of the orb, you didn't need to _electrocute_ it," The Doctor raised his eyebrows at me, and I shrugged. "The second power is activated by liquefying the globe, and then you drink it, inheriting the full power."

"Well... the outer power activated my locket, and let me come here. So what's inside? What's the whole thing?"

The Doctor pointed at me and turned the TARDIS monitor to face me. "I don't know yet. But I can scan it here and find out, if you'd like. Only it would take a long time."

I didn't necessarily know what I had to lose by simply finding out what this did. "Okay, yeah."

"Yeah?" The Doctor looked for confirmation. I nodded, and he continued. "Okay—But the thing is, Nova, this globe was meant specifically for you."

"How do you know that? How do you know I wasn't meant to give it to you or something?" I asked, not believing that someone out there had set out to give _me_ a power, stepping away and trying to think.

"It activated _your_ locket when you didn't even touch it. It's not typical for the power to be split between two people. And it ended up in your universe, where you were probably the only Time Lord who could have found it, and the only Time Lord it could have given the power to—and it brought you very specifically here, to your birth universe." The Doctor stepped closer to me. "Whoever took you away, Nova, had _full_ intent on bringing you back—for whatever this is, so much so that they sent you to another universe to insure only _you_ got to it."

I furrowed my eyebrows, knowing that it couldn't have been a coincidence that they sent me to a universe where this was a show I would know everything about—but still not understanding why. "Are you _sure?_ "

"Yes. There's also the fact that since this is from the _Sisterhood_ of Karn—only women can receive these powers."

I pushed past the Doctor to stare at the TARDIS monitor which now had a blueprint version of the glowing orb on it, and an empty information space to the right of it. I shook my head. "I have _no idea_ what this power could be..." I lingered my fingers over the keyboard. "But there's only one way to find out."

I pressed the key that started the scanning process, and watched as a progress bar appeared on the monitor that read: _0.01% scanned_.

 


	32. The Pandorica Opens (pt 1)

"Where did you just land?" I asked, stepping into the console room where the Doctor and Amy stood.

"Planet One," The Doctor answered.

"Ooh, oldest planet in the universe?" I smiled.

"Yes! There's a cliff of pure diamond and, according to legend, on the cliff there's writing, letters 50 feet high, a message from the dawn of time, and no one knows what it says, cause no one's ever translated it– till today." The Doctor explained. It felt like all my bones went stiff when I remembered what the letters said, and what the start of this was.

"What happens today?" Amy asked.

The Doctor tapped her nose. "Us. The TARDIS can translate anything. All we have to do is open the doors and read the very first words in recorded history."

The Doctor held out both of his hands, one for Amy to take and one for me. We placed our hands in his, and he led us out the open doors.

The words on the cliff read "HELLO SWEETIE," just like they were supposed to—but I still couldn't help but feel that there was something wrong about it.

**888**

"Right place?" Amy asked, as we stepped out of the TARDIS again just a few moments later.

"Yup," I sighed, looking on at the Roman camp in front of us.

"Just followed the co-ordinates on the cliff-face. Earth. Britain." The Doctor checked his watch. "1:02am. No, pm." The Doctor looked up from his watch, and finally noticed his surroundings. "No, AD..."

Amy stepped closer. "That's a Roman Legion."

"Well, yeah. The Romans invaded Britain several times during this period." The Doctor pointed out.

I shrugged. "I never had to learn British history."

"Well, I know. My favorite topic at school: Invasion of the hot Italians." Amy wiggled her eyebrows at me, and I laughed and shook my head. "Yeah, I did get marked down for the title."

A breathless Roman soldier with a red stain by his lips ran up to us, breathless, saluting and dropping himself to his knees. "Hail Caesar!"

"Hi," The Doctor responded awkwardly.

The Roman soldier looked up for just a few moments, enough to recognize me, grab my hand, and kiss it for a time that was far longer than necessary. "Hail, Arsinoe."

I raised my eyebrows in confusion—that was new. "Okay... Hello to you too."

"Welcome to Britain. We are honored by your presence," The soldier recited, still on the ground, the Doctor giving me a weird look, and taking the hand that the Roman kissed in his.

"Well, you're only human. Arise..." The Doctor lifted our intertwined hands up, signaling the man to stand. "Roman... person."

"Why does he think you two are Caesar and Arsinoe?" Amy asked, sounding disgruntled at the fact that things were already looking to be weirder than usual, which was saying something for the Doctor.

"Cleopatra will see you now." The Roman soldier began leading the way.

I held up the hand that the Doctor was holding, and showed the lipstick stain that was on it to the Doctor. "You know, Arsinoe was Cleopatra's sister."

"Oh boy," Amy smiled mischievously.

**888**

"Hello, Sweetie," River greeted—completely decked out as Cleopatra, with two servants tending to her in her ornamental tent.

"River!" Amy was surprised. "Hi."

The Doctor strode up to her, and after a few moments, leaned in and scolded—"You graffitied the oldest cliff-face in the universe."

"You wouldn't answer your phone," River reprimanded back. "And I wasn't sure if Nova had hers yet or not."

"I do," I took my cell phone, which was now activated for inter-universe communication out of my pocket. "This is my first time here with it, though."

"Thought so," River clapped her hands, and the servants brought a scroll to rest upon her hands, which she held out to the Doctor.

"What's this?" The Doctor asked.

"It's a painting. Your friend Vincent." The Doctor snatched the scroll from her quite forcefully, and walked over to unroll it on a table as River kept talking, approaching behind him. "One of his final works. He had visions, didn't he? I thought you ought to know about this one."

"Nova?" Amy grabbed my arm and brought me between her and the Doctor, to look at the painting. "Doctor, what is this?"

It was an oil painting of an exploding TARDIS—one that meshed into the starry night.

It was the future.

"Why is it exploding?" Amy asked.

"I assume it's some kind of warning," River looked at her pointedly, since the Doctor wasn't currently going to give any response—sitting on a chair and staring at the floor intently, deep in thought.

"Something's going to happen to the TARDIS?" Amy asked. Amy and River kept looking at me for an answer. They both knew about my knowledge, and it was as if they thought that something this dangerous should have the right to be spoiled—but I kept my expression stoic.

"It might not be that literal. Anyway, this is where he wanted you. Date and map reference on the door sign, see?" River pointed to the door sign of the exploding TARDIS, whose coordinates and time matched where we were standing.

"What's it called?" I asked, and Amy and River immediately looked at me with caution, as if every word I said was a clue.

In a way, it might have been. River responded. "The Pandorica Opens."

"The Pandorica? What is it?" Amy asked.

"You know what it is," I said to her. Again, she and River stared at me intently, as if I had just revealed another piece of the puzzle. I huffed in annoyance at their slowed reactions to everything I said, and simply went to sit down on the chair the Doctor had previously left in order to pace around.

"A box. A cage. A prison. It was built to contain the most feared thing in all the universe." River explained.

"And it's a fairy tale; a legend. It _can't_ be real," The Doctor paced in frustration.

"If it is real, it's here and it's opening. And it's got something to do with your TARDIS exploding." River glared at him. The Doctor brought a bunch of scrolled-up maps to the table in front of them. "Hidden, obviously. Buried for centuries. You won't find it on a map!"

"No. But if you buried the most dangerous thing in the universe, you'd want to remember where you put it," The Doctor looked up from the maps, getting an idea.

**888**

When we arrived at Stonehenge, the Doctor immediately began scanning the rocks with his screwdriver, and River began using her own scanner and pacing around.

"How come it's not new?" Amy asked, touching one of the stones that were already worn with age. I walked up beside her and touched the stone also. In modern days, no one was allowed to get this near it, much less touch it, so I was slightly excited.

"Because it's already old. Been here thousands of years. No one knows exactly how long." River looked up to the sky.

"Okay, this Pandorica thing. Last time we saw you, you warned us about it, after we climbed out of the Byzantium," If Amy figured she couldn't get anything out of me, she might as well try to get something out of River.

"Spoilers!" River chided, holding a finger up to her lips.

"No, but you told the Doctor you'd see him again when the Pandorica opens. And you specifically told Nova she _had_ to remember that."

"That's true," I joined in, almost forgetting about that day of the angels.

"Maybe I did. But I haven't yet. But I will have," Amy smiled and shook her head, and River continued on with her scanner. "Doctor, I'm picking up fry particles everywhere. Energy weapons discharged on this site."

The Doctor stood on top of a large stone. "If the Pandorica is here, it contains the mightiest warrior in history. Now, half the galaxy would want a piece of that. Maybe even fight over it." He jumped off the stone, and put his ear to it. "We need to get down there."

**888**

Hours later at nightfall, our equipment had been set up—lights all over the floor, and some sort of device connected to River's scanner sat on top of the stone the Doctor had been observing all day. "Right, then. Ready."

River pressed some buttons on her device, and the large stone slowly slid aside, revealing a dark stone staircase underneath. "The Underhenge," The Doctor pulled out his sonic screwdriver to use as a flashlight, and River had her own, as we began trailing down the steps slowly.

**888**

The Doctor stepped out of a narrow passage and used his screwdriver to light a torch, and light another torch River was holding with it. I stood back with Amy, eyes wide and looking around the place, as the Doctor lifted up a large board that was acting as a lock against a set of giant metal doors.

They pushed the doors open slowly, revealing a cavernous room—with the Pandorica sitting in the middle of it. "It's the Pandorica."

"More than just a fairytale," River breathed, smiling.

The Doctor stepped in the room slowly, only stopping momentarily when he stepped on something strange—a Cyberman's arm.

I moved a bit ahead, and rested both my hands on the Pandorica, moving over slowly and tracing its circular pattern as the Doctor followed. "So, what's the fairytale anyway?"

"There was a goblin, or a trickster, or a warrior. A nameless, terrible thing, soaked in the blood of a billion galaxies; the most feared being in all the cosmos. And nothing could stop it, or hold it, or reason with it. One day it would just drop out of the sky and tear down your world." The Doctor explained quietly.

"How did it end up in there?" Amy asked.

"You know fairy tales," The Doctor smiled just barely. "A good wizard tricked it."

River gave her flaming torch to Amy. "I hate good wizards in fairy tales—they always turn out to be him."

"So it's kind of like Pandora's box, then? Almost the same name," Amy waved the torch around carefully. "Is that what you meant, Nova?"

"Exactly," I told Amy before that she knew what the Pandorica was, because she did.

"Sorry, what?" The Doctor placed his torch in a holder and began scanning the Pandorica with his screwdriver.

"The story—Pandora's Box, with all the worst things in the world in it." Amy explained in a secretive, excited voice. "That was my favorite book when I was a kid."

The Doctor stopped scanning to walk up to Amy with a worried look that she didn't understand. "What's wrong?"

"Your favorite school topic, your favorite story. Never ignore a coincidence, unless you're busy. In which case, always ignore a coincidence." The Doctor left to go back to the Pandorica.

"Busy-ness is subjective. And so is the worst thing in the world," I tried.

Amy gave me a strange look again, one that read, I-know-that-was-a-clue-but-I-can't-tell-what-it-means, before focusing back on the Doctor. "So can you open it?

"Easily. Anyone can break _into_ a prison, but I'd rather know what I'm going to find first."

River studied her scanner nervously. "It's already opening. There are layers and layers of security protocols in there, and they're being disabled, one by one. Like it's being unlocked from the inside," River pressed her ear and the scanner against the Pandorica.

"How long do we have?" The Doctor asked, also pressing himself against the box.

"Hours at the most."

"What kind of security?"

"Everything. Deadlocks, time-stops, matter-lines."

The Doctor and River were speaking to each other in hushed tones now, almost as if sharing a secret, and I didn't really feel like I had the mental capacity to interrupt anymore—and just crossed my arms, staring on at the thing, Amy pacing around mindlessly beside me.

"What could need all that?" The Doctor asked.

"What could get past all that?" River retorted.

I wondered if this was how Amy felt when the Doctor and I spoke like this. Probably not.

"Think of the fear that went into making this box. What could inspire that level of fear?" The Doctor pressed both his hands against the box, and stared directly at it. "Hello, you. Have we met?"

"So why would it start to open now?"

"No idea."

I sighed deeply, and I guess Amy noticed, because she cleared her throat and interrupted. "Hmm, and how could Vincent have known about it? He won't even be born for centuries."

"Stones!" The Doctor began scanning the stones all around him in the cave, the ones that stretched out above the ground. "These stones are great big transmitters, broadcasting a warning to everyone, everywhere, to every time zone. The Pandorica is opening!"

"Doctor... everyone, everywhere?" River worried, but the Doctor ignored her.

"Even poor Vincent heard it in his dreams. What's in there, what could justify all this?" The Doctor began pacing again, back towards the box.

"Doctor, _everyone_?" River tried again, to no avail.

"Anything that powerful, I'd know about it. Why don't I know?"

"Doctor," I placed my hands on his arm gently, stopping him from moving or rambling any further. " _Everyone_ is getting this message."

"Oh." The Doctor paused, staring back at the box.

"Oh? Oh, what?" Amy worried now.

"Okay, if it is basically a transmitter, we should be able to fold back the signal," River began holding her scanner up to the pillars, hard at work.

The Doctor did the same with his screwdriver. "Doing it."

"Doing what?" Amy asked again.

"Stonehenge is a transmitter, and it's been around for thousands of years already—which means it's been transmitting this message for an extremely long time, enough to reach light years away—so who heard this message? Who's coming right now?" I explained to her.

"Well, who?" Amy asked.

I motioned my head back towards River and the Doctor, who were figuring it out. River held up her scanner to a stone and spoke in fear. "Around this planet... there are at least ten thousand starships."

"At least?" Amy huffed, stunned.

"Ten thousand, a hundred thousand, one million—I don't know! There's too many readings," River tapped at her device.

"What kind of starships?" The Doctor asked.

Almost as if in response, a robotic alien voice stated, "Maintaining orbit," and another similar one responding to it, "I obey. Shield cover compromised on ion sectors."

"Daleks. Those are Daleks," Amy recognized.

"Wonderful," I exclaimed sarcastically. Daleks were probably my least favorite so far, and I still couldn't control the feeling of anger and defense I got at their presence like I did before with Bracewell.

The Daleks continued rambling on their technical procedures, and River stated that she knew what they were also. The Doctor remained silent for just a moment before snapping out of it.

"Yes, okay, okay, okay... Dalek fleet; minimum, twelve thousand battleships, armed to the teeth," The Doctor paced quickly, throwing his screwdriver from one hand to the other before turning around and shouting. "Ah! But we've got surprise on our side! They'll never expect four people to attack 12,000 Dalek battleships, cause we'd be killed instantly. So it would be a fairly short surprise. Forget surprise."

"Doctor, Cyberships," River added.

"No, Dalek ships, listen to them, those are Dalek ships." The Doctor reasoned.

"Yes; Dalek ships _and_ Cyberships!" River exclaimed.

"And also, a bunch of other types of ships," I tried helping.

The Doctor tried to formulate a plan as fast as possible. "Well, we need to start a fight, turn them on each other. It's the Daleks... they're SO cross..."

"Sontaran. Four battle-fleets." River added again.

"Sontarans! Talk about cross, who stole all their handbags?" The Doctor continued pacing wildly.

"Terileptil. Slitheen. Chelonian. Nestene. Drahvin. Sycorax. Haemo-goth. Zygon. Atraxi. Draconian. They're all here—for the Pandorica." River finally read.

"Told you," I said quietly.

"What are you?" The Doctor trailed his hand down the box. "What could you possibly be?"

 


	33. The Pandorica Opens (pt 2)

Above ground, the night sky was exploding with light from thousands, and perhaps even millions of starships. It was almost blinding to look at.

"What do we do?" Amy asked, beginning to panic.

"Doctor, listen to me! Everything that's ever hated you is coming here tonight. You can't win this. You can't even fight it. Doctor, this once, just this one time, please, you have to run. And this _has_ to include you, Nova." I refused to tell River of my knowledge, but she was highly skeptical if we would make it out alive. I almost shared her suspicion.

"Where would we go?" I tried explaining.

"How would you fight?!" River shouted.

The Doctor pulled out his binoculars and peered out over the hill. "The greatest military machine in the history of the universe..."

"What is? The Daleks?" Amy asked.

"No! No, no..." The Doctor looked out without his binoculars. "The Romans!"

**888**

I left with River to try to get to the TARDIS, not wanting her to be alone if I could help it. I had to admit that when I looked at her—there was something familiar there, and it had nothing to do with the fact that I had once seen her on TV.

When we dismounted from our horses, two soldiers held up swords in front of us in an X formation, preventing us from going any further, and we were led into the tent.

"So, I return to my command after one week and discover we've been playing host to Cleopatra... and Arsinoe. Who were in Egypt. And _dead_!" The commander barked at us.

"Yes." River admitted, with a cold tone in her voice. "Funny how things work out."

The ground shook as a whirring sound came from overhead, which I knew to be the sound of more ships arriving. The Roman commander glared. "The sky is falling and you make _jokes_. Who are you?"

"Good question," I shrugged.

"When you fight Barbarians, what must they think of you?" River glared back.

"Oh, riddles now?" The Commander boomed.

"Where do they think you come from?" River pressed.

The commander drew his sword threateningly. "A place more deadly and more powerful and more impatient than their tiny minds can imagine!"

River pulled out her disintegrator gun and shot it at a cabinet, which in turn, disappeared, as if proving that her sword was bigger and better than his. The guards were stunned. "Where do I come from? Your world has visitors. You're all Barbarians now."

"What is that? Tell me, what!" The commander demanded, pointing his sword directly at her.

"A fool would say, the work of the gods. But you've been a soldier too long to believe there are gods watching over us. There is, however, a man, and this woman," River gestured to me, and I smiled, forgetting I was included in these things now. "And tonight they're going to need your help."

"Sir?" A roman voice called from outside, and I recognized it.

"One moment," The commander pointed his sword at both River and I, before heading towards the doorway.

The commander and the Roman I knew to be Rory mumbled for a moment, before he turned back to us. "Well, it seems you have a volunteer."

**888**

Amy pulled out the ring box she found a few days earlier from her jacket pocket, and opened it, finally asking what she had been dying to know for a long time. "So..." She turned to the Doctor, who was studying the Pandorica. "Are you proposing to someone?"

"I'm sorry?"

"I found this in your pocket," Amy held the open box up to him, and he finally looked up. "I don't know how Time Lords propose, but..."

"No. No, no, that's ah..." The Doctor interrupted, "A memory. A friend of mine, someone I lost." The Doctor reached out to grab the box, but Amy only moved it backward. He seemed weak in the way he didn't try reaching for it again, and only looked down sadly. "Do you mind?"

"It's weird, I feel..." Amy stared at the ring intently, as she had been doing often these past few days, but still couldn't piece it together. "I don't know, something..."

"People fall out of the world sometimes, but they always leave traces. Little things we can't quite account for. Faces in photographs, luggage, half eaten meals... rings... Nothing is ever forgotten, not completely. And if something can be remembered, it can come back."

**888**

After having been chased by a Cyberman, Amy stumbled backward into a closed off space. It was eerily quiet, and she pressed her ear against the giant doors. "Doctor?"

A sword slashed through the doors, barely missing Amy's head, and she yelped and stumbled back as the doors opened, revealing a Cyberman impaled against them, and a familiar looking Roman man who killed it.

Only he wasn't Roman, and he wasn't anything more than just familiar to Amy. "Who... who are you?"

"Hello Amy," Rory smiled.

Amy still didn't recognize him, but didn't get to say anything more about it, as she fainted and he caught her in his arms.

**888**

"She's fine, Doctor, just unconscious," Rory assured the Doctor.

The Doctor rushed in the room and scanned her with his screwdriver for good measure. "Yes, she's sedated, that's all. Half an hour, she'll be fine." The Doctor turned around and pat Rory and another unnamed Roman on the shoulder, walking a few paces away to lean on a stone and think. "Okay, Romans, good, I was just wishing for Romans, good old River and Nova. How many?"

"50 men up top, volunteers. What about that thing?" Rory had to admit that he was a bit startled by the fact that the Doctor didn't address him, and wondered if everyone had forgotten him—but he also knew how the Doctor worked, and wanted information.

"50? Not exactly a legion." The Doctor sounded disappointed.

"Your friend was very persuasive, but it's a tough sell," Rory avoided names, assuming he didn't know him now.

"Yes, I know that, Rory, I'm not exactly one to miss the obvious. But we need everything we can get." The Doctor pulled out two large looking weapons from a stone box in the ground. "Okay, Cyber-weapons. This is basically a sentry box. So, headless wonder here was a sentry." The Doctor tapped the impaled Cyberman with one of the weapons. "Probably got himself duffed up by the locals. Never underestimate a Celt."

Now that Rory realized the Doctor knew him, he was very confused. "Doctor..."

"Hush, Rory. Why leave a Cyberman on guard? Unless it's a Cyberthing in the box. But why would they lock up one of their own? Okay, no, not a Cyberthing, but what, what? No, I'm missing something obvious, Rory!" The Doctor stood just inches away from Rory's face. "Something big, something right slap in front of me, I can feel it!"

Rory gave up, figuring there was a lot on his mind right now and he would get it in his own time. "Yeah, I think you probably are."

"I'll get it in a minute," The Doctor walked out of the space, and Rory just remained there, dumbfounded for a moment, until he heard the Doctor drop his weapons with a clash. He came back through the doorway very slowly, until he was face-to-face with Rory again, and poked him in his metal-armored chest. Rory swayed back every so slightly. "Hello again."

"Hello," Rory replied carefully.

"How've you been?" The Doctor asked awkwardly.

Rory nodded. "Good, yeah, good. I mean, Roman."

"Rory, I'm not trying to be rude, but you died." The Doctor pointed at him.

"Yeah, I know, I was there."

"You died and then you were erased from time. You didn't just die, you were never born at all; you never existed!"

"Erased?" Rory thought he was on to something. "What does that mean?"

The Doctor stood open mouthed, hands thrown up in confusion. "How can you be here?"

"I don't know. It's kind of fuzzy."

"Fuzzy?"

"Well, I died and turned into a Roman. It's very distracting!" Rory moved to run a hand gently over Amy's cheek. "Did she miss me?"

The Doctor didn't respond, only looked on solemnly, until intense whirring sounds blared and the ground shook, and Rory and the Doctor ran out to the Pandorica, which was now glowing green.

"What is it?" The tiny stone gears began turning, clicking, whirring, and glowing. Rory didn't understand it at all. "What's happening?"

"The final phase." The Doctor scanned the Pandorica with his screwdriver for just a moment, before going to move his hands with the gears and press his ear against it again. "It's opening."

**888**

"You have to admit, it's sort of beautiful. Millions of different races uniting for something," I admired, staring up into the sky on horseback, waiting as River dialed the Doctor on her scanner.

"Well, you know what they say—beauty is terror." River responded to me, before speaking to the Doctor. "You're surrounded, have you got a plan?"

River and I sat on horses over the hill, only able to see the madness happening by the stones from a distance. Roman soldiers, Rory, and the Doctor, all scrambling around for something they weren't even sure of themselves.

"Yes! Now hurry up and get the TARDIS here. I need equipment!" The Doctor called back.

River hung up her phone and looked to me one last time. "You don't want to go over there?" I shook my head, and she sighed. "Alright... together?"

I smiled. "Always."

**888**

When River and I entered the TARDIS, we immediately set to work pulling levers and typing information—but the TARDIS wasn't responding. "What's the matter with you?" River asked it.

I stopped helping, and she continued trying to pull at levers and push buttons, but the TARDIS only reacted worse, jolting around more. "Nova, why aren't you helping?"

"It won't work," I walked forward to stop River from moving another button. "It's going to take us where we need to go."

"Why?" River tried.

"Um..." I began, and River sighed, knowing this was my version of her 'spoilers'. "Since when does the Doctor have a cell phone?"

 


	34. The Pandorica Opens (pt 3)

When we stepped outside of the TARDIS, I had to stop myself from smiling at the familiar surroundings. This may have been Amy's beginning, but in a way, it was mine, too.

"What is this place, Nova? I'm already here, you might as well tell me." River pulled out her scanner as she walked into the house. It seemed that she was less timid to walk into a place when I was with her, because I most likely wouldn't let her walk into a death trap.

I walked ahead of her and stopped at a place in the hallway, the place with the radiator on the floor the Doctor was handcuffed to so long ago. "This is the exact spot where I met the Doctor for the first time."

River gave a hint of a smile. "Why has it brought us here? Because of you?"

"Never because of me," I walked ahead into the room that I knew to be Amy's, quietly, but briskly. "This is Amy's house, Amy's room. Look around."

River put her scanner in her pocket, and began looking through the contents on Amy's desk. She pulled out one book—a small picture book on Roman's Britain, and handed it to me. She then grabbed another one, a similar style book about Pandora's Box.

"Making sense yet?" I asked sadly.

River took the other book from my hand and quickly walked out, back into the TARDIS, and handed me her communicator/scanning device. "You talk to him."

"What—why?" I asked, staring at the thing in my hand and not knowing what to do with it.

"He trusts you more—just do it, press the button." River said, before going to try and work on the TARDIS again.

I didn't understand her tone, but I did it anyway.

"TARDIS, where is it, hurry up!" The Doctor exclaimed immediately, sounding frustrated.

"Um..." I tried quickly, so thrown off by his shouting that I wasn't sure of what to say at first.

Thankfully, the Doctor changed his tone. "Nova? Is that you?"

"Yes. Listen to me. The TARDIS wouldn't respond to us and left us at Amy's childhood home, and River found these two books, one on Romans and one on Pandora's Box. The Romans can't be real, Doctor. They look _exactly_ like the ones in this picture book."

"Something's using her memories." The Doctor figured, in hushed tones.

"Doctor, I don't think they're using her memories to get to her. I think they're using them to get to _you_. It's a trap. This _can't_ be real, Doctor. So who are those Romans?" I tried in vain to speed up the process, not exactly knowing what different outcome I was going for in the first place.

"They might think they're real; the perfect disguise. They actually believe their own cover story, right until they're activated." The Doctor answered again.

River held up a picture she found to me, of Amy dressed as a policewoman, and Rory dressed in a plastic version of the exact same Roman costume the Romans at Stonehenge were wearing. "Doctor, Rory..."

"I know. It doesn't make sense."

Suddenly the TARDIS jolted, and smoke arose from the center console. I scrambled to my feet, moving back over to River, trying to help her at least settle it down for a bit, but nothing was working, and the Doctor was shouting at me through the scanner. "Nova? River? Nova! What's happening?!"

"Doctor, something's wrong with the TARDIS—we can't get out, we're stuck in June 26th, 2010!"

"You need to get out of there now! Any other time zone, just go!" The Doctor panicked.

"I know—I can't, we can't—! We can't move, we can't land, we can't even shut it down, we can't do anything—something else is controlling this!"

The TARDIS stopped thrashing for just a moment, and an eerie voice took over, repeating the same sentence over and over—one that was all too familiar to me. " _Silence will fall... Silence will fall..._ "

"Well, great. That's not at all terrifying, or creepy." I said, frustrated.

"Nova—you know the cracks are everywhere. The TARDIS exploding causes them, and you can stop it if you just land!" The Doctor shouted again.

"I can't land—I'm going to try to open the doors!" I shouted back, hanging up the phone, knowing it was a lost cause anyway.

**888**

Rory was writhing on the floor, struggling against his programing, tears flowing freely down his face in front of his fiancé who didn't remember him. "Listen to me, you have to run. You have to get as far away from here as you can! I'm a thing. I'll kill you. Just go!" Rory began sobbing to himself, now. "Please, no, I don't want to go. I'm Rory! I'm... I'm..."

"Williams." Amy uttered, tears also flowing down her face—but only now did she finally understand why. "Rory Williams from Leadworth. My boyfriend." Amy grabbed him by the shoulders, pulling him up. "How could I ever forget you?"

"Amy, you've got to run," Rory whispered in agony, his head twisting around painfully. "I can't hold on! I'm going!"

Amy grabbed his shoulders, making him face her. "You are Rory Williams and you aren't going anywhere, ever again."

**888**

The Roman soldiers shut down and restarted, and grabbed the Doctor by the arms, leading him backwards towards the Pandorica. The Doctor wasn't too afraid, or at least, he didn't show it, because he had to figure this out. "Plastic Romans. Duplicates, driven by the Nestene Consciousness, eh? Deep cover, but what for? What are you doing? What's in there, eh? What's coming out?" He tried asking.

"The Pandorica is ready," One of the soldiers responded.

"What, you mean it's open?" The Doctor asked, not being able to see it as how he was being held facing the opposite direction.

"You have been scanned. Assessed. Understood. Doctor." The Doctor slowly turned his head to notice a white Dalek had uttered that sentence, and two more yellow and red colored ones materialized beside it.

**888**

"The ring. Remember the ring? You'd never let me wear it in case I lost it." Amy chuckled a little through her tears.

"The Doctor gave it to me." Rory managed to whisper.

"Show me the ring. Show it to me." Amy demanded.

"Amy," Rory croaked in pain.

"Come on! Just show it to me."

With a shaky hand, Rory pulled out the box and opened it, holding it out to her. She smiled.

**888**

The soldiers had turned the Doctor to face the Daleks, and the Pandorica. "Scanned? Scanned by what, a box?" The Doctor could barely hide the fear from his voice. Half of him wished that Nova was here right now, but the other half of him knew she was probably safer in the TARDIS despite its malfunctions.

"Your limits and capacities have been extrapolated." The Doctor turned to see a Cyberman approach, followed by Judoon and Sontarans.

"The Pandorica is ready." A Sontaran roared.

"Ready. For you," The Dalek echoed, as the Pandorica finally opened.

The Doctor tried his best to resist against the soldiers ushering him forward, face pale, tears in his eyes—filled with fear.

**888**

"There it is," Amy held Rory's face, which was quivering, and gasping short breaths. "You remember. This is you, and you are staying."

Rory couldn't prevent his fake hand from opening down, revealing a laser gun inside. "No," he tried, but his laser fired—and Amy threw her arms around him one last time, before falling limp to the ground.

**888**

"Nova—listen to me, your future self will hate me for this, but your present self _needs_ to do this." River grabbed me by the shoulders suddenly, tears falling down her face, several parts of the TARDIS bursting in flames and sparking all around us.

"What do you mean?"

"You have to go back to the Doctor." River shook me. "With your locket."

"I can't do that, River. And he doesn't need me, okay, _you_ need me, or he needs you—but not me. This doesn't have anything to do with me, I know it doesn't." I tried making sense to her. I knew what would happen—and I wasn't a part of it.

"Yes it does, Nova! When will you finally see it? It might not seem like much now, just tiny changes here and there—but all those changes will add up, and something _big_ will happen, and you _cannot_ leave him when it does. You really can't." She shook her head, tears in her eyes.

"What are you talking about?" River spoke to me with such intensity, that it was beginning to scare me, and tears were forming in my eyes also.

"He doesn't need me, Nova. He needs _you_. Trust me. I'm sorry." River slammed her hand on my locket before I could protest—sending me whirling back to the other universe.

**888**

The Doctor sat in the Pandorica, and it may have seemed like he was sitting on a throne if nearly every part of his body wasn't clamped down somehow. There were metal bars holding his legs and torso back, and giant cuffs around his wrists, his hands in fists. There were even some metal objects on his shoulders—all he could move were his hands and head. He stared out at all the aliens staring back at him in a painful kind of awe. "You lot, working together, an alliance... How is that possible?"

"The cracks in the skin of the universe," a Dalek began.

"All reality is threatened!" A Sontaran complained.

"All universes will be deleted." A Cyberman finished.

"What? And you've come to me for help?" The Doctor asked.

"No. We will save the universe from you!" A Sontaran pointed their weapon at him.

"From me?" The Doctor couldn't believe it.

"All projections correlate. All evidence concurs. The Doctor will destroy the universe." A Cyberman echoed.

"No... No, no, you've got it all wrong!" The Doctor tried.

"The Pandorica was constructed to ensure the safety of the alliance. A scenario was devised from the memories of your companion... A trap the Doctor could not resist. The cracks in time are the work of the Doctor. It is confirmed." The aliens took turns explaining.

"No. No, no. Not me, the TARDIS. And I'm not in the TARDIS, am I?" The Doctor shouted desperately.

"Nova is in the TARDIS. Companion memories. The Doctor in the Pandorica. Two traps in one." A Dalek explained.

The Doctor glared, his high tone of panic now low and dark as he spat at them—" _What_?"

"We await her arrival." A Cyberman stated.

"Why? What do you need her for? There's only room for one in here." The Doctor was back into interrogation mode.

"Nova can pilot the TARDIS, and will stop at nothing. Nova will not go in the Pandorica. Nova can escape impossible places." The aliens uttered again.

"What are you going to do?" The Doctor demanded to know.

"We will take her essence—she cannot survive long without it." The Sontaran explained.

The Doctor's face paled, expression narrowed, fists clenched harder than ever. "When I get out of here—and I assure you, somehow, I will—you will regret _ever_   touching her!"

"The Doctor will also stop at nothing. But the Doctor will not escape." A Dalek corrected.

"Try me," The Doctor growled. He knew it might be impossible to escape, and he was overwhelmed with fear—but the fear currently had nothing on his anger.

"We await her arrival." The Cyberman stated again.

He knew what they were going to do—and he knew that there wasn't much he could do to stop it. There wasn't much of anything he could do, besides wait.

 


	35. The Big Bang (pt 1) / Court (pt 3)

Knocking my head against a mop awkwardly was a huge contrast from the manic, exploding TARDIS I had just left. I wanted to stay in the closet and leave—but the inter-universe headache was making me feel claustrophobic, so I stepped out and regained my breath.

I was about to re-enter and go back, until a familiar voice approached. "Hey—headache? Travelling again?"

I brought myself to look up at Dylan for a few moments, remembering that I told him everything, now. "Yeah. And I need to go back immediately. How's Meredith, any word?" I asked quickly. I knew she was in prison now, but we would still get updates on her wellbeing.

"Who's Meredith?" Dylan asked.

I glared at him seriously. "Don't joke like that, Dylan."

"I'm... not?" Dylan was worried now, and just as confused as I was. "Scarlette, who's Meredith?"

"Oh—never mind, I'll be back," I told him, before running off to the tech department.

**888**

I walked up to Meredith's cubicle—only it wasn't Meredith's anymore. I stepped into it slowly, looking around and noticing that everything was blank, nothing was pink, and everything was normal. I began shuffling through miscellaneous items on the desk—moving aside touchpads, keyboards, and monitors—until I found something that gave me all the answer I needed: A small, shiny crack of light.

It was bad enough that the cubicle was no longer Meredith's—but it was even worse that it never was hers in the first place.

**888**

I barely remembered my journey back to the closet I declared safe to travel through: the only thought running through my mind was that I had somehow brought the Silence to my universe, and if I didn't find a way to stop it, it may very well destroy everything. The Doctor could set off a second big bang and fix things in his universe—but I was seriously shocked with a lack of ideas on how to save mine.

My thoughts of Meredith washed away when I landed, and whirring sounds and shouts shot at me from every direction possible—some things grabbing my arm.

"Stop! Stop..." I tried.

"Weak... We are at an advantage!" A Sontaran voice cheered.

"Get _off_ of me!" I struggled, my headache almost empowering me more to stomp my feet and thrash about as much as I could—but the men grabbing me wouldn't budge.

"Nova," I stopped struggling when I heard a familiar voice call my name. I looked up, and my vision cleared enough. "I'm sorry."

I shook my head, tears in my eyes both from the pain, and the sight of the Doctor trapped in front of me. "It's okay."

"Remove her essence!" The Sontaran commanded.

I felt extremely uncomfortable as one of the Romans pulled my locket out from under my shirt—but even worse and they brought it up over my head.

Similar to the time my locket was smashed in the car door by Amy—I felt like all the blood in my veins had been replaced with heavy sand—and was slowly loosing control of all voluntary motion; I couldn't move a single muscle in my arms or legs even if I tried, and my eyes fell closed.

I tried to speak, but I didn't have enough energy for that either.

I opened my eyes just in enough time to notice another Roman place my locket in a box beside the Doctor's head in the Pandorica—and fell unconscious.

**888**

"Hey... come on... come on, that's it. Wake up," A familiar voice soothed me. I felt a warm piece of metal being pressed to my sternum, and like that piece of metal was slowly warming my whole body—bringing it back to life.

I blinked my eyes open, and coughed. I sat up slowly, and after a few moments of dizziness—I regained my feeling and stared up at the Doctor who was holding me, knelt before me, confused. "What just happened...?"

"Well," The Doctor was pressing my locket to the space between my collar bones, energizing me. Steadily, he grabbed me by my waist and helped me stand up. "My enemies trapped me in the Pandorica Box, along with your locket—which weakened you, because it contains your essence now."

"Essence?" I asked.

"Travelling between universes is a great power. And with all great power comes a great price. Whatever is powering that diamond is now also powering your entire being, so being separated from it is dangerous, and being separated from it too long or destroying it is deadly." The Doctor explained to me quietly, still holding me close as I found the strength to stand again.

"So she can't be separated from it, or she'll die?" Rory asked.

"It's fully a part of her now. She might be able to survive a few days without it—but they'll be painful, weak days, unless she has some other boost of power. Either way, the other boost of power can't last too long, no matter what it is. She'll need this _exact_ diamond back eventually, so... yes." The Doctor answered, before changing the subject. "And, also—how did you do that?"

Rory held up a sonic screwdriver. "You gave me this."

The Doctor pulled out his own sonic screwdriver from his inner jacket pocket, holding it up. "No, I didn't."

"You did. Look at it." Rory held up his screwdriver.

The Doctor approached him slowly, but I interrupted by throwing arms over Rory. "Sorry—I just remembered, I can't believe you're back!" I pulled away slightly, grinning. "I missed you!"

Rory managed a small laugh, "Believe me, I missed you all too."

The Doctor interrupted by tapping his screwdriver against Rory's—creating a spark that made them both jump back. "Temporal energy. Same screwdriver, at different points in its own time stream. Which means it was me who gave it to you. Me from the future." The Doctor grinned to me now. "I've got a future, that's nice." The Doctor looked behind Rory and I to see a petrified Dalek. "That's not."

"Yeah. What are they?" Rory asked.

"History has collapsed. Whole races have been deleted from existence. These are just like after-images—echoes, fossils in time." The Doctor approached a stone of a Nestene Soldier, and tapped on its head harmlessly. "The footprints of the never-were... so much for regret."

"Uh, what does that mean?" Rory asked again.

"Total event collapse. The universe literally never happened." The Doctor turned to him sharply.

"So, how can we be here? What's keeping us safe?"

"Nothing. Eye of the storm, that's all. We're just the last light to go out..." The Doctor remembered something. "Amy. Where's Amy?"

**888**

"I killed her," Rory gulped, trying to hold back his tears.

The Doctor and I knelt beside Amy. I smoothed her hair from her face, still feeling emotional despite the fact that I was mostly sure she wasn't going to die. "Oh, Rory..." The Doctor looked down.

"What am I?" Rory asked us. I didn't want to answer seeing the heartbroken look on his face.

The Doctor did instead, not looking at him. "You're a Nestene duplicate. A lump of plastic with delusions of humanity." The Doctor began using his sonic to scan Amy.

"But I'm Rory now. Whatever was happening, it's stopped. I'm Rory!" He shouted.

I knew what the Doctor was doing, so I didn't interrupt, but I still rolled my eyes at him when he said—"That's software talking."

"Can you help her? Is there anything you can do?" Rory begged.

The Doctor closed his screwdriver and put it back in his pocket, standing up. "Yeah, probably, if I had the time."

"The time?! You had time for Nova!" Rory complained.

The Doctor walked off ahead of Rory. "All of creation has just been wiped from the sky. Do you know how many lives now never happened? All the people who never lived? Your _girlfriend_ isn't more important than the whole universe."

Rory tapped the Doctor on the shoulder so that he turned to face him, and punched him in the face, sending him to the floor. "SHE IS TO ME!"

I gasped and brought my hands up over my mouth, as the Doctor stood up and laughed. "Welcome back, Rory Williams! Sorry, had to be sure. Hell of a gun-arm you're packing there." The Doctor moved his jaw around, caressing his cheek for a few moments, before striding back to Amy. "Right, we need to get her downstairs. And take that look off your plastic face. You're getting married in the morning!"

**888**

The Doctor and Rory put Amy in the Pandorica, The Doctor holding her head up, checking for any signs of consciousness and preparing, while Rory stood to the side. "So you've got a plan, then?"

"Bit of a plan, yeah. Memories are more powerful than you think, and Amy Pond is not an ordinary girl. Grew up with a time crack in her wall. The universe pouring through her dreams every night. The Nestenes took a memory print of her and got more than they bargained for. Like you. Not just your face, but your heart and your soul." The Doctor kept moving Amy's head around, until he held it so that his thumbs were on her cheeks. He closed his eyes. "I'm leaving her a message for when she wakes up, so she knows what's happening."

The Doctor stepped out, and soniced the Pandorica closed, leaving Amy inside.

"Woah, woah, what are you doing?!" Rory asked.

"Saving her. This is the ultimate prison. You can't even escape by dying. It forces you to stay alive." The Doctor explained to him.

"But she's already dead. " Rory declared bitterly.

"Mostly dead. The Pandorica can stasis-lock her that way. All it needs is a scan of her living DNA and it'll restore her."

"Where's it going to get that?"

The Doctor looked at his watch. "In about two thousand years."

"One thousand, eight-hundred and ninety-four years, to be exact." I stated, forcing myself not to look down for once when the Doctor and Rory gave me strange looks.

"Exactly," The Doctor smiled.

**888**

Amy fell out of the Pandorica on all fours, gasping heavily.

"Are you alright? Who are you?" The little girl standing before her asked.

Amy sat up on the floor. "I'm... fine." Amy gasped. "I'm supposed to... rest. Got to rest, the Doctor says."

"What Doctor?" The little girl asked.

"He's in here," Amy tapped her head. "Left a message in my head like I'm an answerphone. Where am I?" Amy looked around. "Hang on. National Museum, right? I was here once when I was a little..." Amy looked back up to the younger version of herself, not finishing the sentence for a reason. "Yeah, complicated." She stood up and held out little Amelia's hair, measuring her height against herself. "Let's see, it's what... 1996?"

"Who are you?" Amelia asked again.

Amy looked around the museum. "It's a long story." She stopped before a panel on the wall, describing the history of the Pandorica. "Ooh, a very long story."

**888**

The Doctor took the vortex manipulator from River's bag.

"She's going to be in that box for _two thousand years?!"_ Rory asked again.

"Yeah, but we're taking a shortcut. River's vortex manipulator." The Doctor fixed it a lot, making sure it was fastened correctly to his wrist. "Rubbish way to time travel, but the universe is tiny now. We'll be fine."

"So the future's still there, then? Our world?" Rory asked.

"A version of it. Not quite the one you know. Earth alone in the sky. Let's go and have a look." The Doctor nudged him.

"Come on, Rory, just put your hand on it. It... _should_ be safe. And Amy will be safe, too." I tried convincing him, but I already knew it wasn't going to work.

"This box needs a guard. I killed the last one," Rory began, moving to look up at the center of the Pandorica.

"No. Rory, no. Don't even think about it." The Doctor stopped him, pacing around.

"She'll be all alone," Rory sympathized.

"She won't feel it." The Doctor retorted.

"You bet she won't!"

"One thousand, eight hundred and ninety-four years, Rory. You won't even sleep, you'd be conscious every second. It would drive you mad."

"Will she be safer if I stay? Look me in the eye and tell me she wouldn't be safer." He glared at the Doctor.

I sighed. "Rory—"

"ANSWER ME!" He shouted.

The Doctor and I looked at each other for just a moment, before he answered solemnly. "Yes. Obviously."

"Then how could I leave her?" Rory looked up at the box.

The Doctor sighed, and chuckled. "Why do you have to be so...human?"

"Because right now, I'm not." Rory answered sternly, walking away.

The Doctor smiled something bittersweet, and began tapping on buttons on his manipulator. "Listen to me. This is the last bit of advice you're going to get in a very long time. You're living plastic, but not immortal. I have no idea how long you'll last. And you're not indestructible. Stay away from heat and radio signals when they come along."

Rory put on his helmet, and the Doctor intertwined his vortex-manipulator hand with mine tightly, spinning me inwards so that my back was now against his chest, and he had to reach around me to continue pressing the buttons on his manipulator, his arms completely encircling me. "You can't heal, or repair yourself. Any damage is permanent. So, for God's sake, however bored you get, stay out of..."

**888**

"Trouble!" The Doctor finished his sentence.

I stepped away from him as I noticed a dalek approaching us. "Exterminate!"

"Oh!" The Doctor turned and noticed Amy and Amelia together. "Two of you? Complicated."

"Well, come on!" I grabbed little Amelia's hand and began running, as the Doctor grabbed Amy.

The Doctor stumbled into a mannequin with a fez on its head and took it, noticing that there was nowhere else to go.

Amy followed him back and forth. "What are we doing?"

The Doctor flipped the fez over in his hands. "Running into a dead end, where I'll have a brilliant plan, that basically involves not being in one."

"What's going on?" The voice of a watchman echoed down the hallway, a flashlight beam hovering from a distance.

"Get out of here. Go! Just run!" The Doctor half-heartedly tried convincing the rest of us.

"Drop the device," the slowly incoming Dalek beeped.

"It's not a weapon. Scan it. It's not a weapon, and you don't have the power to waste!" The Doctor rushed, his back against a partition of an exhibit, the rest of us piled just behind him.

"Scans indicate intruder unarmed." The Dalek approached the watchman, whose flashlight was shining bright in front of his face.

"Do you think?" The watchman dropped his flashlight, and then the fingers in his hand dropped down—revealing a laser gun that shot directly into the dalek's eyestalk.

The Dalek spun around manically. "Vision impaired! Vision... " It drained of energy, powering down.

Amy peered behind the doorway, noticing who the watchman really was. "Rory."

"Amy!" Rory looked at Amy like she couldn't have been real.

Amy dashed up to him and hugged him tight, and Rory stuttered, stepping back, "I'm sorry. I'm sorry, I couldn't help it. It just happened."

"Oh, shut up," Amy kissed him, until the Doctor approached right between the two of them.

"Yeah, shut up, cause we've got to go. Come on!" He tried, but they completely ignored his existence.

Rory was still staring at Amy with that same, bewildered look on his face. "I waited. 2,000 years, I waited for you."

"No, still shut up." Amy kissed him again, more intensely and longer this time.

I pulled the Doctor's arm back before he could interrupt them again, and he gave me a pouty look until I pointed out the Dalek. "Is it really dead?"

The Doctor approached it slowly. "The light!" He looked to me for approval, and I raised my eyebrows. "The light from the Pandorica, it must have hit the Dalek."

The Dalek's weapon fidgeted, powering up again. "It's... waking up!" I shouted, breaking Amy and Rory from their kiss.

"Out, out, out!" The Doctor ran, grabbing little Amelia's hand, the rest of us following.

**888**

"So, 2,000 years. How did you do?" The Doctor asked, once we were in a safer space in the museum.

"Kept out of trouble," Rory replied.

"Oh," The Doctor realized he still had the fez in his hand, and gave it a strange look before putting it on his head. "How?"

"Unsuccessfully," Rory answered.

"Well, you're still alive and so is Amy—that's what matters," I pointed out, and Rory gave me a brief smile, before noticing that the Doctor had picked up a mop.

"The mop! That's how you looked all those years ago when you gave me the sonic," Rory exclaimed.

"Ah! Well, no time to lose then," The Doctor activated his vortex manipulator and left.

Everyone turned to me as if I would have an answer of what to do next. It was strange seeing the Doctor just suddenly leave like that, and I shrugged upon the realization that it was something I did to him all the time. "Huh. Now I know how it feels."

Little Amelia tugged on my shirt. "Do you know what to do?"

"Just wait a few more moments. We're not leaving without him." I promised, and like clockwork, the Doctor reappeared before us.

"Oops, sorry," The Doctor used the mop to block the door keeping the Dalek out, and zapped away again.

"How can he do that, is he magic?" Amelia asked, looking up to both Amy and I.

Neither of us had time to answer, because the Doctor reappeared again, and dashed up the steps before us. "Wait!" He stopped, turning back. "Now I don't have the sonic, I just gave it Rory 2,000 years ago."

I rolled my eyes and continued up the steps as the Doctor zapped away again, only to return what felt like milliseconds later. The Doctor grabbed the screwdriver out of Amy's top pocket, "Off we go! No, hang on," he approached Amelia. "How did you know to come here?"

Amelia reached out of her pocket and got a pamphlet, and handed it to the Doctor. The Doctor seemed confused for just a brief moment, before realizing, "Ah, Nova's handwriting!"

He tossed me a pen, which I ran over to the information desk with, quickly scribbling a note on it before the Doctor came up behind me with a pamphlet, and zapped away again.

"Oh my goodness!" I exclaimed, overwhelmed, and tried going up the steps again, when the Doctor appeared just a few steps in front of me, stopping me from going anywhere again. "Really!"

"Sorry!" The Doctor pat my shoulders, stepping to the side out of my way.

"What is that, how are you doing that?" the older Amy asked this time.

The Doctor spun back around to explain. "Vortex manipulator... cheap and nasty time travel—very bad for you. I'm trying to give it up."

"We really need to go!" I urged again impatiently, starting up the stairs.

I almost made it to the top—but before I could run any further, the Doctor appeared in front of me, only this time looking disheveled and burnt. He grabbed me by the shoulders harshly, and yanked me forward so he could whisper something in my ear—the answer on how to save my universe.

As the dead version of the Doctor collapsed down the steps and whispered something different to the present Doctor, Amy and Rory panicking over him, I gulped hard, preparing myself for what I knew I had to do.

I now knew how to save my universe from disappearing forever—but I couldn't think of a single way to save myself from death in the process.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hopefully the effects the locket has on Nova are a little less confusing now, and certain incidents involving it before this chapter (way back in the eleventh hour with the car door, in amy's choice with the dream lord, etc.). 


	36. The Big Bang (pt 2)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those who are super into intense plot details like me: I don't think I'm going to explain why specifically Meredith was erased in the next chapter so I'll just say it here: as mentioned before during the lodger episode, Meredith helped Nova experiment with the locket! So that's why.

When we stepped onto the roof, three things were very evident the moment I got there. First, the Doctor looked stupid with a fez on. Second, the sun was definitely River in the exploding TARDIS. And three, I had to die.

"What, it's morning already? How did that happen?" Amy asked.

"History is shrinking. Is anybody listening to me? Universe is collapsing. We don't have much time left." The Doctor jumped up onto a platform and used his screwdriver to scan a satellite dish.

"What are you doing?" Rory asked.

"Looking for the TARDIS."

"But the TARDIS exploded."

"Okay, then. I'm looking for an exploding TARDIS," The Doctor removed the satellite dish from the poles, sparks flashing.

"I don't understand. So, the TARDIS blew up and took the universe with it. Why would it do that? How?!" Amy asked frantically.

The Doctor stepped up on the ledge of the roof, holding up the dish to the sky. "Good question for another day. But for now... total event collapse means that every star in the universe never happened. Not one of them ever shone. So, if all the stars that ever were are gone, then what is that?" The Doctor pointed to the giant yellow fireball in the sky. "Like I said, I'm looking for an exploding TARDIS."

"But that's the sun," Rory tried.

"Is it? Here's the noise that sun is making right now." The Doctor amplified the satellite dish with the sonic, and the whirring of the TARDIS resonated. "That's my TARDIS burning up. That's what's been keeping the Earth warm."

"Doctor, there's something else. There's a voice." Rory squinted.

"I can't hear anything," Amy shook her head.

"Trust the plastic," Rory pointed to his head, annoyed.

The Doctor adjusted settings on his sonic, and soon enough the familiar voice was heard, repeating, "I'm sorry, my love," over and over.

"Doctor, I need... I need to go up there," I said passionately, albeit somewhat hesitantly. This was part one of what I had to do to save my universe.

The Doctor stepped down from the ledge and walked up close to me, and asked seriously, "Why?"

"I—just, _really_ do," my eyes watered at the thought of everything that I had to do, and that this was just the beginning. "Please, _please_ just trust me," I whispered.

I tried my best to keep any tears from falling, but I guess the Doctor noticed the glassy look in my eyes, because he took off the vortex manipulator from his wrist and grabbed my hand, securing it on mine, punching numbers in. "Whenever you're ready."

"Thank you," I breathed one last time, before pressing the button.

**888**

"River!" I exclaimed as soon as I materialized in the TARDIS by the door.

River looked down at her watch, and back up to me. "Well, finally!"

"I have to tell you something," I walked up to River, grabbing her arms. "To even it out."

"Even what out—? Oh, no, Nova, no spoilers!" River stopped me. Since she spoiled something for me, I was going to spoil something for her—because I had to.

"No, this is _really_ important! The Doctor isn't going to die! He's not. Not today during this, okay? Everything will work out perfectly fine and no one's screwed anything up—so you have to give me time to talk to him, okay? I need him to do something."

"You never know for sure if he's going to die. If there's anything I've learned from you it's that everything, all time, all fixed points can be rewritten. And I _know_ that look on your face, this won't be good for you." River pointed at me condescendingly.

"That doesn't matter, River. I messed up. I messed up _so_ much and now so many people's lives are in danger because of me and I need to fix it—you just need to promise you'll give me time. There's going to be a time today where you'll feel like you'll need to say a long goodbye to the Doctor but you _won't_ , because he's not dying." I rushed.

"What if you're wrong?" River tried.

"Then _all_ of us will die. This is the only way."

River sighed, and then hooked her arm through mine. "Fine. But if you die, I'm going back in time and _killing_ you."

**888**

"Amy! And the plastic Centurion?" River asked upon landing.

"It's okay, he's on our side," The Doctor assured her.

"Really? I dated a Nestene duplicate once... swappable head, it did keep things fresh. Right then, I have questions. But number one is this... What in the name of sanity have you got on your head?"

" _Thank_ you," I sighed.

The Doctor seemed offended. "It's a fez. I wear a fez now. Fezzes are cool."

Amy and River turned to me, and I crossed my arms and smiled as Amy snatched the fez off the Doctor's head and threw it up in the air, and River shot at it with her blaster gun, destroying it.

With her gun still poised in the air, a Dalek levitated up to the sky where the fez was shot. "Exterminate!"

"Everybody RUN!" I exclaimed, rushing everyone back inside as the Doctor also yelled for everyone to run, holding up the satellite dish and using it to deflect the Dalek's blasts.

**888**

"Shh, it's moving away, finding another way in," The Doctor soniced the hatch in the ceiling closed, and climbed down the ladder. "It needs to restore its power before it can attack again. Now, that means we've got exactly—" The Doctor checked his watch. "Four and a half minutes before it's at lethal capacity."

The Doctor continued down the stairs, everyone following. "How do you know?" Rory asked.

"Because that's when it's due to kill me," The Doctor responded simply.

"Kill you?" River looked to me, and I titled my head as if saying—this is what I was talking about.

"Oh, shut up, never mind. How can that Dalek even exist?" The Doctor asked, continuing down the hallway. "It was erased from time and then it came back. How?"

"You said the light from the Pandorica..." Rory tried to comprehend.

"It's not a light, it's a restoration field, but never mind. Call it a light. That light brought Amy back, but how could it bring back a Dalek when the Daleks have never existed?"

"Doctor, the thing that you told me when you... died on the stairs," I interrupted. "Objects copy atoms. That's what you said."

The Doctor snapped, and pointed at me. "When the TARDIS blew up, it caused a total event collapse; A time explosion. It blasted every atom in every moment of the universe. Except..."

"Except inside the Pandorica," Amy finished for him.

"The perfect prison. Inside it, perfectly preserved, a few billion atoms of the universe as it was. In theory, you could extrapolate the whole universe from a single one of them, like cloning a body from a single cell. And we've got the bumper family pack."

Now I've done two out of the three things I needed to do to ensure my universe would be saved: tell River the Doctor wouldn't die, tell the Doctor what he had to say to me (without raising suspicion to my idea), and now, there was only one thing left.

"No, too fast, I'm not getting it." Rory shook his head.

"The box contains a memory of the universe, and the light transmits the memory. And that's how we're going to do it." The Doctor explained again.

"Do what?" Amy asked.

"Relight the fire. Reboot the universe. Come on!" The Doctor continued, everyone following again.

"Doctor, you're being completely ridiculous!" River chased after him. "The Pandorica partially restored _one_ Dalek. If it can't even reboot a single life form properly, how will it reboot the whole of reality?"

The Doctor stopped running and turned to her. "What if we give it a moment of infinite power? Transmit the light from the Pandorica to every particle of space and time simultaneously?"

"Well, that would be lovely, dear, but we can't, because it's _completely impossible_!" River turned back to me. "Nova, help me."

I approached them, and shrugged. "It's not impossible. You just need a little spark..."

River rolled her eyes, now getting the notion that both of us were probably going to try to kill ourselves in attempt to save the universe. "Oh, I hate you both. A spark for what?"

The Doctor whispered, "Big Bang Two! Now listen..."

The Doctor was cut off by the zap of a beam, and a voice echoing, "Exterminate!"

The Doctor fell to the floor, and Rory shot the Dalek, temporarily draining it of energy again. "Doctor. Doctor, it's me, River. Can you hear me? What is it? What do you need?" River knelt by the Doctor.

"River, get up, come on," I pulled her up, letting the Doctor struggle to press buttons on his vortex manipulator, vanishing away.

"Where did he go?" River asked.

"Downstairs, 12 minutes ago. Kill this Dalek first and then I'll show you." I cut to the chase.

River shook her head, bewildered at my antics, but then shrugged, changing the settings on her blaster. "Alright. No problem there,"

The Dalek was killed much faster than I remembered.

**888**

"How could he have moved? He was dead!" Rory exclaimed upon seeing that the Doctor wasn't lying on the staircase.

"Who told you that?" River asked.

"He did," Amy answered.

River smiled, looking to me. "Rule one: The Doctor lies to everyone, except Nova. Rule two: Nova tells the truth to everyone, except the Doctor."

"That's new," I furrowed my eyebrows in worry.

"Oh, no it isn't," River smirked.

**888**

"Doctor!" Amy shouted, the four of us running down the hallway to see the Doctor at the end of it, sitting unconscious in the Pandorica.

"Why did he tell us he was dead?" Rory asked when he got there.

"We were a diversion. Long as the Dalek was chasing us, he could work down here." Amy knew.

River held the Doctor's face. "Doctor, can you hear me? What were you doing?"

The sun grew brighter and closer, and Rory could see it through the window. "What's happening?"

"Reality collapsing. Look around," I told him.

Back in the museum hallway, exhibits were empty. History was being erased.

"Time is running out. Doctor, what were you doing? Tell us! Doctor?" River shook his head gently.

The Doctor began breathing just barely, his eyes opening a little as he slowly whispered, "Big... Bang... Two."

"The Big Bang. That's the beginning of the universe, right?" Rory asked.

"What, and Big Bang Two is the bang that brings it back? Is that what you mean?" Amy tried.

The Doctor gave a small nod.

"The TARDIS is still burning. It's exploding at every point in history. If you threw the Pandorica into the explosion, right into the heart of the fire... Then let there be light. The light from the Pandorica would explode everywhere at once, just like he said." River explained upon realization.

"That would work? That would bring everything back?" Amy made sure.

I crossed my arms. "Yup. Look, he wired the vortex manipulator into the box so he can fly it into the TARDIS, the heart of the explosion."

**888**

Just as River promised, she was only with the Doctor for a few moments, hardly even a minute, before she came back out and looked to me. I rushed over quickly.

I came to a halt before him, finding it hard to get the words out as he stared at me, holding his hand out.

I slipped my hand in his slowly, and he pulled me closer to him. I was nearly the same height as him since he was sitting high up in the box.

"Nova. The Last Time Lady." The Doctor whispered.

"That's weird. I've never heard anyone say it out loud," I let out a brief chuckle of bewilderment, before getting to the point. "Doctor, something happened. Something went wrong."

"I know..." The Doctor didn't understand what I was getting at. "Time is erasing."

"Not just that. When I went back to my universe, the crack was by Meredith's old office and no one remembered her. And when you told me objects copy atoms I don't think it just meant the Pandorica."

"Nova, no, don't even think about it." The Doctor started, now knowing what I meant, and not wanting it to happen. "I don't know how long it takes to reset the universe. But, it's probably long enough for you to—" The Doctor choked on the last word, not wanting to say it out loud; not wanting it to be true.

"Doctor, it's the only way. My locket is the object that transported the atoms of the Silence to my universe—from just being around it, or—" I shook my head, stopping myself from adding it was also parasitical in my brain.

"You have to take my locket with you."  
  



	37. The Big Bang (pt 3)

The Doctor didn't say anything, only stared at me with a hard expression, as if he were trying to figure me out.

"Doctor, please." I pleaded.

"You'd be without the locket for as long as it takes the universe to reset, and for me to get back to you. You'll need another source of power to live," The Doctor stated blankly. All I could do was shrug helplessly, not wanting to say the words he already knew— _I don't have one_.

I looked down, a tear rolling down my face, my brain no longer scrambling for another way out. The Doctor cupped my cheek and moved my face back up, using the pad of his thumb to wipe the tear away. I gulped. "You'll do it? You'll take it with you?"

"On one condition." The Doctor hushed.

It wasn't what I expected to hear. "What is it?"

"You have to let me give you something." He moved his hand away from my face and grabbed both of my hands in his, and I was confused.

"Give me what?"

"You can't ask, you just have to accept it."

"That's technically two conditions," I barely smiled, another tear rolling down my face.

"Fine then, two conditions. Do you accept?" The Doctor asked, noticing my hesitation, before pulling my hands to bring me closer to him again, and speaking in a low voice. "Nova... do you trust me?"

"I do," I whispered, afraid of myself for how quickly I responded.

Then, the last thing I expected happened—The Doctor brought me even closer, moved his hands up to my face, and kissed me.

I was confused at first; this couldn't have been what he meant—and then I felt it. Our lips were warm, almost tingling, like the passion seeped from his mouth and into my bloodstream, consuming me and giving me power. When a tear fell again I couldn't tell whose it belonged to—and my hands were tangled in his hair, pulling at it. His arms were grabbing me around my waist, pulling me closer and down to him as if it were any more possible. It felt like forever and only a few seconds all at once—constantly moving, hungry and desperate, until it slowed to a stop.

With my forehead against his, I took a deep breath—and when I exhaled, a golden mist flowed from my lips. My face was blotchy and my cheeks were wet as I confirmed my suspicion: the Doctor had given me his regeneration energy; years of his life.

"You may still be weak, but it'll keep you alive," The Doctor whispered against my lips.

I didn't know what to say in return—part of me was mad at him for doing it, but part of me also knew I probably couldn't have stopped him anyway. Thank you didn't feel like enough—and I was speechless: both from the intensity of the kiss, and the new surge of energy coursing through my veins. I threw my arms around him and we stayed like that—for as long as we could.

**888**

He was right. I was weak, but at least I wasn't dead.

"Nova!" Amy shouted, waking me up. I realized that I was in her bed, in her room, and she was already awake—wedding dress hanging in her closet and makeup spread out all over her dresser.

She hoped on the bed and sat me up by grabbing my shoulders. "You're my friend. My American friend! My sick, nerdy, disabled American friend!" She shook me, stating this as if it were a revelation.

"I am..." I said slowly, not sure if it would be a good idea or not to instantly remind her of everything that happened with her old life with the Doctor. She was so preoccupied with her new life that had just been restored, that she forgot the adventures with the Doctor and I.

"Well, let's get you up, then!" Amy exclaimed. Only then when I tried to move did I realize what Amy meant when she said I was sick. I was drained of energy and couldn't move the lower half of my body—and in the corner of the room was a wheelchair that belonged to me.

**888**

I stared down at my red dress, meant to be flowing around my waist—awkwardly bunched up in my wheelchair instead. I wasn't sat at the table in the front, but off to the side of the dance floor by some other bridesmaids. My weakness was not only physical, but mental also, making it somewhat hard to concentrate on everyone's droning speeches until Amy began to make a scene.

"Shut up, Dad!" Amy stood up suddenly, in her wedding dress and all, everyone in the reception confused.

"Amy?" Rory asked for just a second.

"Amelia?" Her newfound dad wondered also, too taken aback to be angry.

"Sorry, but shut up, please! There's someone missing... someone important. Someone so, _so_ important..." She began, trying to find something within her own words.

"Amy, what's wrong?" Rory tried again.

"Nova?" Amy asked, her eyes searching for me near the side of the room. I didn't know what she wanted, but I smiled at her in reassurance, and she continued. "Sorry, everyone. But when I was a kid, I had an imaginary friend."

Her mother sighed. "Oh no, not this again."

"The raggedy Doctor. My raggedy Doctor. But he wasn't imaginary. He was real." She said with conviction, leaning forward on the table now.

"The psychiatrists we sent her to!" Her mother cried.

"And Nova can walk!" Amy added.

"Well that one's new," her father muttered.

"I remember you! I remember! I brought the others back, I brought Nova back, I can bring you home, too. Raggedy man, I remember you..." She shouted. "And you are late for my wedding!"

There was only a very brief moment of awkward silence before the glasses on the table began shaking and clinking against each other. The ground trembled, the chandelier swayed, and the crowd looked on in wonder as Amy continued.

"I found you. I found you in words, like you knew I would. That's why you told me the story... the brand new, ancient blue box. Oh, clever. Very clever." She almost laughed through the tears flowing down her face.

The wind in the room grew stronger, and my heart stuck in my throat as I heard the familiar whirring of the TARDIS.

"Amy, what is it?" Rory asked again.

Amy stared straight ahead at the spot where the wind was gathering. "Something old. Something new. Something borrowed. Something blue."

The TARDIS finally materialized in the room, and Rory stood, remembering too in that moment. "It's the Doctor! How did we forget the Doctor? I was plastic. He was a stripper at my stag... long story."

Amy ignored the sounds of the crowd around her, and hauled her wedding dress up, climbing over the table to stride up to the TARDIS. She knocked on the door. "Okay, Doctor. Did I surprise you this time?"

The TARDIS door opened, revealing the Doctor leaning against the frame inside, wearing a black top hat with a white tie and tails; a white scarf hanging loosely around his neck. "Er, yeah. Completely astonished. Never expected that. How lucky I happened to be wearing this old thing," he stepped out onto the floor. "Hello, everyone. I'm Amy's imaginary friend, but I came anyway," he shook Amy's dad's hand.

The bright smile on his face faltered when our eyes locked. "Right then, everyone. I'll move my box..." He entered the TARDIS again, and I put a hand up to my neck—almost expecting for my locket to be there, which I usually played with out of nervous habit—but he still had it.

**888**

I stared numbly at the people in front of me. The party quickly went back in full swing by the time the Doctor parked his TARDIS somewhere and got back to me.  My eyes were locked on Rory talking to some little girls in the distance even as the Doctor moved to stand in front of me.

It wasn't until he knelt before me that I finally looked at him, nothing changing about my expression. I didn't know what to think about the fact that he seemed so dramatic when he left, and then barely spared me a glance the moment he got back. I didn't know what anything he did was supposed to mean, and I was too weak to try and figure it out. It took an unnecessary amount of strength to gulp. "I'm alive, but I can't really move."

"I know, I almost couldn't believe it," the Doctor slowly reached out to touch my hands resting on my lap, as if he were afraid they would disappear if he touched them. He looked back up at me and smiled, ecstatic that I was, in fact, real. "You're sad." He noticed, smile faltering again.

"I'm confused. I'm weak. I'm tired." I explained.

The Doctor reached into his pocket and took out the locket, draping it over my head as he said, "I think I can fix that."

Just like before, he pressed the locket between my collarbones with his right hand. Immediately, I felt warmth spread from that area throughout me, like my blood was circulating through my veins for the first time. He kept his right hand pressing the locket against me and circled his other arm around my waist, lifting me up slowly to stand.

I felt one last surge of weakness, and stumbled almost in slow motion. My back arched, so to anyone else it may have looked like he was dipping me gracefully. His arm was still around my waist, but the other was now tangled in my hair. It felt like an eternity, and like I was only inches away from the ground. I closed my eyes, feeling like I was being baptized. When he brought me back up slowly, the breath I took then felt rejuvenating, refreshing—like mint water coursing through my body. Like I had been brought back to life.

When I opened my eyes again, his face was closer to mine than I was expecting—and his bright green eyes pierced through me. We were both silent, neither of us daring to move. A tension stretched through the air like thin glass—both of us afraid of moving the wrong way and shattering it.

Once again, seconds felt like an eternity, until someone else broke the tension instead.

"There you both are! Oh Nova, I'm so glad you're okay," The Doctor kept his eyes on me and slowly stepped away, and River replaced him, stepping forward to throw her arms over me.

When I pulled away from her—I was overjoyed at my ability to physically step back.

Everyone began talking again, and I stood still in peace, content just observing the room around me. I couldn't help but smile when I saw Rory and Amy together. I was no longer weak, or tired, or sad.

However, when I looked at River and the Doctor together—I knew I was still no less confused.

**888**

"I'm sorry about earlier." River snuck up behind me, from where I stood on the dance floor with some of Amy's friends I had just met.

I turned to her, the others not paying much attention to me anyway. "About what earlier?"

"In the TARDIS, when I forced you to leave me. You know, _he doesn't need me, he needs you_ ," River laughed at herself, putting a hand on my shoulder. "I was just being dramatic—you know I did it to keep you safe, right? I needed you safe." She insisted. "But I do suppose it was good to know he wouldn't die."

I had almost forgotten she had said that, and now that she was taking it back, theories that I had barely dared to imagine were proven false. "Right."

"Good," River smiled, turning to walk away.

"Wait!" I interrupted, and River turned to me again. "The next time we see each other—the Byzantium, that's the first time we meet. You need to tell me then who you are to me, and that Prisoner Zero is real." I remembered.

River nodded. "That's going to be strange for me... but it sounds good."

River turned to leave again, and I interrupted her, again. "Wait! Who _are_ you to me?"

River smiled, and shook her head. "I told you, I'm your best friend."

"Okay then, not to me, to the Doctor," I pressed, part of me not wanting to hear the answer.

"Spoilers," River smirked, turning away again.

She walked off quickly, but I still caught up to her, grabbing her arm and spinning her back to me again. "No! Please, just tell me."

River didn't look me in the eye, and shook her head. "Do you really want to hear this answer? The truthful, honest answer?"

I paused for a moment, but quickly resolved that I needed this to make this easier, to spare as much heartbreak as I could for everyone involved. My voice was quiet anyway. "Yes."

"I wasn't being dramatic when I said all the little changes will add up to something big. There's something the Doctor hasn't told you—something that will keep bringing him back to you no matter what could happen." She spoke quietly.

She paused for so long that I felt forced to try to figure out what she meant. "Back to me? Like, because of... quantum space—"

"No, no, nothing like that," River almost chuckled. "Because of _you_. Sure, you're an interesting girl. You're smart. You're a classified alien scientist of the 21st century. You're storm that's just beginning to brew—a firecracker that's just been set. I mean, your hair _glows_. But none of that is it."

"Then what is it?" I couldn't help but interrupt anymore, desperate.

"You're a disruption in the fabric of space and time. Everything that should have been a fixed point in time in the Doctor's life is no longer—because of you. And the same goes for my life. Nothing is fixed as it should be." She almost sounded bitter as she spoke. "So who am I to the Doctor? I have no idea. But that's not the question you should be asking."

I was jarred by her answer, but continued anyway. "What should I be asking, then?"

"Who are _you_?"

**888**

"Okay but, when you say who I am do you mean like, who am I am as in my personal identity and feelings like this is some metaphorical thing and I shouldn't be worrying about the affairs of other people? Or do you mean who I am as in, like, who I am as a Time Lord and who my parents are and how and why I got here?" I rushed, panting as I ran up to River outside, trying to match her fast-walking pace.

"My gods, you really never stop, do you?" River sighed, not slowing her pace but looking at me, and sighing once again once she realized she was going to give an answer to my hopeful expression. "I mean both."

"Oh... that actually doesn't help at all!" I complained, trying to think of a better question.

River hushed me, and grabbed me by my hand, pulling me through a tangle of bushes quietly until I realized what we were approaching.

"Did you dance? Well, you always dance at weddings, don't you?" She asked.

The Doctor, who was putting the key into the lock of the TARDIS, turned to face us. "You tell me."

River gasped almost teasingly, "Spoilers."

We walked up to each other slowly, and I awkwardly untangled my hand from River's, moving to stand between them. I couldn't help but notice that with the way we stood, I was in the position of a priest ordaining their wedding.

The Doctor held out the blue TARDIS journal to her. "The writing's all back, but I didn't peek."

There was a strange pause that I couldn't interpret. River tucked the journal under her arm before saying, "Thank you," and the Doctor also handed her vortex manipulator back to her, gently, playfully—I couldn't tell exactly how—only it wasn't in the normal way people returned things to each other. Or maybe it was, actually, I didn't know anymore. I tried to quickly think of a time the Doctor had returned something to me to draw up a comparison, but the only thing I came up with was returning my locket—and both of those times were far from normal.

The Doctor snuck a glance at me before putting his hands in his pockets and asking, "Are you married, River?"

"Are you asking?" River replied carefully, but gracefully—as if she put this kind of care into everything she said while she fastened the manipulator back on her wrist.

The Doctor looked to me for just a moment again. Perhaps he knew that I wanted this answer, too. From the moment we first met, there were always a million things left unsaid between us—but that didn't mean we didn't hear them anyway. "Yes."

"Yes," River quirked her eyebrows.

"No, hang on. Did you think I was asking you to marry me, o- o-or asking if you were married?" The Doctor stammered quickly.

River looked at me also, as if speaking to both of us. "Why do you ask?"

There was a long silence then. When I thought of the question, the most obvious answer seemed to be: because it would help to know, in the grand scheme of things. But when the Doctor and I locked eyes again, we both knew that there was something more than that. Whether either of us knew exactly what that was didn't matter, because neither of us dared to say it.

"Fine. Yes." River replied.

"Yes?" The Doctor asked.

"Yes to what?" I asked.

River smirked, and shrugged. "Yes."

"River... Who are you?" The Doctor asked this in a low, almost sultry voice that freaked me out for a second.

"That's a very good question..." River began on another vague rant, but the gears clicked in my head in that moment. I realized that when River told me I was asking the wrong question—she may very well have meant that I should do some self-evaluation, but she also may have meant...

"Who are you?" I repeated the Doctor urgently.

"A time is coming where you'll realize you already know. You've always known who I am, all along. And... that's when everything changes." River looked directly at me, so I knew she was saying that I was the one who already knew. She reached out to run a hand down the Doctor's chest one last time, before activating her manipulator and vanishing away.

I was staring directly at the Doctor unashamedly, and faced the facts. He had kissed me earlier, but maybe that was just the easiest way to transfer regeneration energy. Then again, there was the fact that he had given it to me in the first place, and then there was everything else...

But now he gulped hard, blushing, staring at the empty space before him that River had left behind. I began to wonder what any of it meant for the millionth time—but for the first, I began to wonder if any of the confusion in my heart was worth it.

And then, as if my brain had subconsciously given me an answer—I remembered something. "Dylan," I said out loud, in shock.

"What?" The Doctor asked.

"Oh my god, with the universe resetting—how long has it been since I've seen Dylan? How long has it been since he's seen _me_?" I asked this to no one in particular, but it was obvious that the Doctor could hear me considering he was only standing a few feet away, and I would have preferred an answer.

However, the Doctor stared at the floor and then simply stepped into the TARDIS, seemingly ignoring me.

"Doctor?" I followed him in.

"You should probably check on Meredith. See if this whole thing even worked," He suggested, not looking at me, glaring hard at the TARDIS monitor

I didn't know where this sudden indifference came from—there were a million different possibilities, and it was similar to the moment after I explained my last flashback to him. I walked slowly behind him to see what he was staring at on the monitor.

It was the progress screen for the orb, which still stuck secure in the center console. The progress bar read: _26.3% scanned._

I closed my eyes, and pressed my locket.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry it's taken me approximately a billion years to get this chapter, i re-wrote it a billion times! i know this kiss had been a long time coming, but it's not exactly what you were all expecting (or at least i hope) because it could have meant a million different things and river is still there and the doctor still doesn't know who nova is so why should he trust her in the first place and also dylan exists and might be a better match for her and WHAT DOES IT all MEAN?
> 
> you tell me... why do you think the doctor is reacting the way he is? what does the orb power do? what does river mean when she says nova already knows? are people even reading this story ???


	38. A Christmas Carol (pt 1) / Trial (pt 1)

I tried to keep my head down when it came to Area 51. Now that there was a huge scandal around me, I didn't really ask questions or make comments as much as I used to. However, when I walked through the big industrial concrete-white hallway again that Monday morning, someone stopped me despite my mental promise to try not to talk to anyone for the rest of my life here.

"You shouldn't have been selfish." Marla stood in front of me, blocking my way, her arms crossed. The hallway was quite wide, but I felt like I shouldn't try to move. After all, I did just have a part in the imprisonment of her girlfriend.

"I'm... sorry?" I tried to give a short answer, but unfortunately it sounded too much like a question for Marla to be satisfied.

"You shouldn't have tried to take your artifact. There was no good reason for it, and Meredith was just trying to help you." Marla continued, an obvious condescension in her voice.

"I'm—You're right. I'm sorry, really." My lips felt warm, and my voice felt stuck in my throat now, but I had run out of tears at this point. Besides, Marla was a part of one of the original families of Area 51. She was powerful, had every right to be angry with me, and was Sally's sister.

"Yeah, right. If you were really sorry you wouldn't even be here—you should be locked up too. The only reason you're not is because everyone your friends with has some kind of influence. Zodiac is the manager. Your dad is on the board, and now he's with my sister. Your _boyfriend_ is the top ranking field agent, and even if he wasn't, everyone loves him anyway."

She spat this at me, and I knew she was talking about Dylan. I couldn't move even if I tried—I felt frozen on the spot. "You go off on your own to assuage your own stupid insecurities and find a _useless_ artifact, and then when it doesn't do anything you try to _steal_ it? Artifacts are not ours! You tried to _steal_ government property. Were you ever even really friends with Meredith? Are you ever even really friends with anyone _,_ or do you just _pretend_ to love them because it means you can get away with—"

"Hey, what's going on here?" Dylan approached us, an obvious anger in his voice at having heard part of the conversation coming down the hallway. I didn't realize that tears were filling my eyes until he snapped me out of her anger.

"Nothing." Marla continued to glare at me with her arms crossed, not sparing him a single glance.

Dylan glared at her anyway, and put an arm around me, urging me gently to walk past her. "Come on."

My eyes were so blurry with tears because I refuse to let them fall, that I didn't even really see where we were going—I just let Dylan lead the way.

At least Meredith existed again.

**888**

Since Meredith was no longer with us, I was with Dylan all day as we went through the procedure of finding a new counterpart from the Technology Division. It was the last thing we had to do before we would get our long vacation days, some appointed time for all the news to die down so incidents like the one in the morning didn't happen again.

We were leaving for the day, walking down the hallway and to the elevators that would lead to the exits when Dylan mentioned it again.

"You don't... believe anything they say to you, do you?" Dylan asked me.

"Um... Well, I want to say I don't but I guess sometimes I can't help it. Bad habit?" I figured.

"But you have to at least know that, objectively, it's not true, right?" Dylan asked again. I didn't reply—not exactly sure what he meant by objectiveness and not really wanting to think about it, so he continued. "Right?"

When I didn't answer again, he stepped in front of me, stopping me. "Scarlette," He grabbed one of my hands in his.

"Dylan," I replied in his same serious tone, playfully mockingly.

"I'm serious. You're amazing and I really hope you don't believe any of it because it's bullshit. They just hate you because you're beating all of them, because you got here first. Because you're smart."

I rolled my eyes and shook my head as I looked away. "Dylan, it's way bigger than that."

"No, it's really not. They're all just jealous in one way or another."

"Then why don't they ever say anything about you?" I spoke louder this time, trying not to yell—but I had been holding this idea back for a long time.

"Because I'm not smart like you. And the culture of my department—it's different. It's not as competitive when everyone's dying." He admitted, and went silent for a moment, before looking into my eyes.

"I think I should tell you something. I meant to tell you before but then you explained the whole..." He gulped. "Universe. Thing."

"Okay..." I nodded.

"I'm in love with you."

I had always imagined the day someone would finally say those words to me so vehemently as he did—and I imagined them to hit me like a ton of bricks, like a sudden rush of air, like whiplash. But instead, I barely even registered the words at first. I just stared at him with the same, neutral expression, the words slowly seeping into me like an injection from a needle, making me go numb.

"Scarlette, please, say something." The look he was giving me was so sincere that normally, it would have had me worried, doing something.

All I could do was stare. "I'm... I'm sorry."

"No, it's okay, I get it." Dylan ran a hand through his hair, and continued walking at a fast pace towards the elevator.

I stood in place for a moment, until I realized what was happening. "Wait, Dylan!" I ran to catch up to him. He was about to open the door to reach the big elevator room. "Don't be mad at me, please." He looked back to me, and I faltered. "I mean I don't _love_ you like that, but, I—I can't lose you either," I struggled to get the words out. "I mean, I still care about you. Maybe just... with time?"

"You think I'm mad because you don't feel anything for me? I'm not mad at you, Scarlette. _You can't help how you feel_. I've just been in this weird place with you for so long..." He bit his lip as he trailed off, and I knew what he was talking about. We were always friends, but there was always something else brewing beneath the surface—something that would only show itself for a few moments before disappearing again. If Dylan had been in love with me this whole time, I could only imagine how agonizing it was.

"Dylan." He was staring at the floor now, a sure sign he wanted to be left alone, but I still followed him through the door. "Dylan!" I stared at him unashamedly while catching up with him, thinking of all the good times we had together, of his laugh, his smile, and every sign he gave me over the years I was so oblivious to—and I knew I didn't want to lose him. He was still my best friend, and after I found out almost everything and everyone in my life was a lie—I realized that my relationship with Dylan was the only real thing I've ever known here.

How could I _not_ feel anything for him? Maybe I was just lying to myself. When we got to the elevators, Dylan reached out to press the elevator button, but I grabbed his arm back. "Wait! You have to—you have to at least talk to me. Why aren't you talking to me?"

He finally looked at me, but I wasn't expecting the dullness in his eyes. "Because I can't help how I feel either."

He reached out to press the button again, and this time I grabbed his hand. "No, please—please don't!" I panicked, my eyes beginning to well up with tears.

"I can't keep doing this, Scarlette," he tried to gently shake his hand out of my grasp, but I held it tighter.

"What do you mean? You can't _not_ work with me. Please, Dylan, you're the only real thing in my life." Tears began falling down my face.

He gave a faint chuckle at that. "This isn't even your life anymore. Look, I can't stay in this place with you when I have no idea what you're like with... over there."

He reached out his other hand to push the button again, and I didn't hesitate in grabbing that one too and blurting, "Then come with me."

Dylan blinked as if I didn't actually say that. I couldn't believe I said it either, but it was probably the only way I could get him to stay with me somehow. "What do you mean?"

"I mean you can come with me, to the other universe over there. You can see what I'm like. We can still be friends, really. I'm not so different. I'm actually exactly the same." I tried convincing him.

Now it was his turn to stare at me numbly, but I knew I refused to take a chance, so I took a step closer and put my necklace around him. "You know how it works. All you have to do is press the button."

I grabbed my locket with one hand, and with my other hand that was still holding one of his, I pressed the back of it into his palm. I folded his fingers closed over it, both of my small hands over his one larger one. He watched me carefully as I did this, until I looked back up at him.

"Are you sure?" He asked me.

I nodded.

**888**

As soon as I felt my feet touch another surface, I quickly took the necklace back from Dylan and stumbled away from him, clutching my head with my eyes still closed, hurting.

"What in God's name--!" An old voice shouted.

I felt some dusty hands cover my ears, which was useful as every sound felt ten times louder, and painful. Those same hands grabbed my arms and helped me back up from my crouched position. After a few more moments in letting my headache subside, no one touching me, I slowly blinked open my eyes to find the Doctor's face close to mine.

My eyes widened at the sudden proximity, and I leaned back. "Your face is all dusty," I exhaled softly.

"Your face is all wet. Were you crying?" He asked, and his eyes immediately went to Dylan.

"Scarlette, where are we?" Dylan grabbed my arm and spun me around to face him. He was squinting a little, and I knew it was because he took some of the inter-universe travelling pain.

"A planet where it's Christmas," I responded.

Dylan stared at me like I was crazy for knowing that, and the Doctor interrupted whatever he was about to say.

"Ooh! Now what's this? I love this-- a big flashy lighty thing-- that's what brought me here." He headed over to a giant control panel with hundreds of flashy buttons, bulbs, and switches. "Big flashy things have got me written all over them! Not actually, but give me time and a crayon." I rolled my eyes while he sat in his chair and swiveled to face Kazan, the old scrooge of this situation. "Now, this big flashy lighty thing is connected to the spire in your dome, yeah? And it controls the sky."

"Controls the sky?" Dylan scoffed, his arms crossed.

The Doctor stood and began pacing around the room. "Well, technically, it controls the clouds, which technically aren't clouds at all. Well, they're clouds of tiny particles of ice. Ice clouds, love that." He smiled at the little boy standing with his family, before turning to Dylan. "Ask Nova about them. Who's she?" The Doctor spun to point at a gentle-faced blonde girl with her eyes closed in what looked to be a frozen, crystallized coffin-- only her face visible.

"Nobody important," Kazan grumbled, leaning on his cane.

"Nobody important? Blimey, that's amazing." The Doctor seemed very offended by that statement. "Do you know, in 900 years of time and space, I've never met anyone who wasn't important before."

The Doctor went back to the control panel, arguing with Kazan about whether or not it was Isomorphic, while Dylan leaned over to whisper into my ear. "I know which one this is-- it's The Christmas Carol."

"Shh!" I pat his arm. "You can't talk about it!"

"What happens here? Doesn't that girl really die?" He looked to the blonde girl locked in stasis. "We can fix that."

I couldn't help but let out a small laugh. "Believe me, it's not that easy."

"Well now I'm here. Now I can help you." He looked at me sincerely, and I was afraid.

"Dylan, there's no way we can do this, and even if we could-- we shouldn't." I declared.

"We can't just let her die!"

"How are we supposed to help her live? How do we know that if she lives, the universe won't collapse? There's a sequence of events. Fixed points in time. Butterfly effects." I whispered harshly.

He was silent for a moment, but still determined. "We can figure something out."

I was about to speak again, when I overheard the Doctor say, "There are four thousand and three people in a spaceship trapped in your cloud belt. Without your help, they're going to die."

"Yes," The old man, Kazran, replied.

"You don't have to let that happen." The Doctor insisted.

"I know, but I'm going to. Bye bye, bored now. Chuck!" The man called, and some guards came to take us away.

I stood my ground, while both the Doctor and Dylan wriggled out of the grasp of the guards.

They both approached where Kazran sat in a tall leather chair by the fireplace, but the Doctor spoke first. "There are four thousand and three people I won't allow to die tonight. Do you know where that puts you?"

"Now, now-- let's take this back a little," Dylan put an arm on the Doctor's shoulder, gently holding him back. "It doesn't have to be like this. After all, _we_ \--" Dylan held out his hand to me, and I took it, the guards letting me go easily. "Are not poor."

The Doctor glared at Dylan. "You're not?"

Dylan raised his eyebrows at the Doctor, and put an arm around me, pulling me close to him and acting like we were together. I knew that this is what he did all the time-- pretended to be someone else, smoothly creating a cover story, but it felt strange to be pulled into it, literally. "No, we're not."

"Oh, please." Kazran rolled his eyes, not buying Dylan's story, but Dylan didn't lose confidence for a moment.

"Look at this," Dylan grabbed my locket and held it out a little so that Kazran could see it. "You think your average poor person could afford a piece of jewelry as fine as this?"

"What do you want?" Kazran grumbled.

"No, no no..." Dylan pulled his arm away from me and moved slowly closer to Kazran. "The question is-- what do _you_ want? What will it take to get you to save the ship?"

Kazran smiled slowly-- a nasty smile that was uncomfortable to look at. "If you're so rich-- then why don't you give me that fine piece of jewelry you so arrogantly own?" He pointed to me-- to the locket on my neck.

"Will that make you save the ship in the sky?" Dylan asked skeptically.

"I'll... _consider_ it."

I didn't know what Dylan was playing at, I've seen him deal successfully before in the field, and I knew he wouldn't hurt me, so I didn't say anything.

The Doctor, however, did not know any of these things. "No!" He shouted this loudly, like a spasm, before recovering into an explanation. "No you won't. You have all the money and power in the world, you don't need anymore. Just press the buttons."

"No." Kazran shrugged simply.

"4,003 people could die tonight. Don't make yourself 4,004," The Doctor spoke with an eerie calmness.

"Was that a sort of... threat-y thing?" Kazran smiled as if the threat was adorable.

"Whatever happens tonight, remember, you brought it on yourself." The Doctor said.

"Yeah, yeah right, get them out of here!" Kazran shouted to his guards. "And next time, try and find me some funny poor people."

Immediately, the guards grabbed us all, dragging us away. The little boy threw a piece of coal at Kazran as he struggled against the guards, and Kazran approached him angrily-- a hand in the air, ready to back-slap the little boy's face.

Dylan stood still, his years of CIA training telling something different than the rest of our natural instincts that made us yell at Kazran not to hit the boy-- and after shaking his wrinkly red hand in the air, he didn't.

"Get them out of here. Get that foul-smelling family out of here. Out!" Kazran ordered.

The family left voluntarily, and the guards didn't bother with us, so we all stayed.

"What? What do you want?" Kazran asked.

"Why didn't you hit the boy?" Dylan asked, as if he already knew all of Kazran's secrets. And in a way, he did.

"Well, I will next time!" Kazran promised.

"You see, you won't. Now why? What am I missing?" The Doctor began pacing, all of us ignoring Kazran's shouts for us to leave.

"The furniture." I answered instinctively.

"The furniture?" Dylan asked me, in a way that meant-- _so you can help, but I can't?_ But to the Doctor, it probably only sounded like he was confused.

"Yes, the furniture. The chairs! Of course, stupid me, the chairs!" The Doctor scanned all the furniture with his eyes and began deducing as he went along. "There's a portrait on the wall behind me. Looks like you, but it's too old, so it's your father. All the chairs are angled away from it. Daddy's been dead for twenty years, but you still can't get comfortable where he can see you. There's a Christmas tree in the painting, but none in this house, on Christmas Eve. You're scared of him, and you're scared of being like him, and good for you, you're not like him, not really. Do you know why?"

"Why?" Kazran asked, bitterness masking hope.

"Because you didn't hit the boy." The Doctor stood closely in front of Kazran, almost whispering. "Merry Christmas, Mister Sardick."

I grabbed Dylan's hand, pulling him towards the door. "Come on, let's go."

Dylan tensed, another plan in mind, but obliged anyway, letting me pull him away.

"I despise Christmas!" Kazran shouted.

The Doctor smiled knowingly and began leaving also. "You shouldn't, it's very you."

"It's what? What do you mean?" Kazran asked.

"Halfway out of the dark."

**888**

"I have an idea," Dylan told us as we walked out.

"Why are you here?" The Doctor asked, ignoring what he said.

"Because I brought him." I answered simply.

"Did he force you to bring him?" The Doctor asked.

"No! I would never force her to do anything," Dylan defended himself.

"Oh, really? Then why was she crying when she got here?" The Doctor stopped walking to glare at Dylan, who had nothing to say. The Doctor stared at Dylan expectantly, and Dylan looked to me.

"It-- It's complicated? It's a long story," I tried.

The Doctor looked at us both skeptically, but before he could say anything, his strange alien phone rang, with a panicking Amy on the other line.

 

 

=

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry I have to drag Dylan into everything right now, but trust me, it will be SO worth it in the end.
> 
> This episode is the last in this book! When I start writing for season 6, I will write it in a different book that will be the second in this series. There's also another book with Area 51 one-shots that give my OCs backstories more explanation but it's on wattpad, username astra0


	39. A Christmas Carol (pt 2)

Kazran stood wide-eyed as he quivered at the image displayed before him: a video he took when he was a kid, that ended in his father hitting him.

"It's okay, it's okay," The Doctor pat Kazran on the shoulder.

Kazran flinched away. "What have you done? What is this?!"

"Oh yeah, sorry that it's in black-and-white. The Doctor tried quantum enfolding but it still wouldn't come out, so I just used a paperclip and... that's not what you meant," I realized too late as Kazran glared at me.

Kazran moved to ring the bell to call his servants, but Dylan interrupted. "Your servants all quit."

Kazran stopped. "What?"

"Apparently they all won the lottery at exactly the same time, which is a bit lucky when you think about it." The Doctor sat in Kazran's chair casually, with the newspaper open.

"There isn't a lottery!" Kazran shouted.

"Yeah, as I say, lucky..." The Doctor smiled mischievously.

Kazran became entranced with the old video being projected on the wall again, until he snapped out of it. "Who are you people?!"

"Ghosts," I quipped.

"Of christmas past." The Doctor finished.

**888**

"Who are you?" Young Kazran asked, as he looked up from his desk to see us climbing in the window.

"I'm the Doctor, that's Nova, and Dylan, and we're your new babysitters." The Doctor grinned as he pointed at us hopped into the room.

The boy sniffled, but stopped crying. "Where's Mrs. Mantovani?"

I moved to sit next to him at his desk while the Doctor kept poking around the space, and Dylan stood behind me with his arms crossed, observing quietly. "Really crazy story, actually. There's no lottery-- but-- she won it anyway!"

Kazran seemed happier now, but still looked to all of us skeptically. "But Mrs. Mantovani's always my babysitter."

"Times change," The Doctor slammed his hands on the desk and peered in closely to the camera. "Wouldn't you say? See, Christmas Past."

"Who are you talking to?" Kazran asked.

"You," The Doctor was referring to the old Kazran who would be watching this video in the future, but either way it was the truth. "Now, your past is going to change. That means your memories will too. Bit scary, but you'll get the hang of it."

"So he's just changing this guy's memories? Just like that?" Dylan asked me quietly.

"No, we all are." I whispered.

**888**

"A little cramped in here, isn't it?" Dylan asked, who sat next to me and was struggling to fit in the tiny closet with his broad shoulders.

"Are there any face spiders in here?" Kazran worried, sitting on my other side.

The Doctor was next to Kazran, a string tied to his finger which was attached to his sonic screwdriver outside. "Nah, not at this time of night. They'll all be sleeping in your mattress. So, why are you so interested in fish?"

"Because they're scary."

The Doctor looked to me for a second before replying. "Good answer."

"What kind of tie is that?" Kazran pointed to his bowtie.

"A cool one."

"It's a bowtie," Dylan clarified, mumbling.

"Why is it cool?" Kazran asked.

"Why are you really interested in fish?" The Doctor countered.

Kazran sighed and looked down. "My school. During the last fog belt, the nets broke and there was an attack. Loads of them. A whole shoal. No one was hurt, but it was the most fish ever seen below the mountains."

"And was it scary?" Dylan asked.

"I wasn't there. I was off sick."

"Ooh, lucky you," The Doctor responded, before seeing the look I was giving him. "Not lucky! Not lucky."

Kazran shrugged sadly. "It's all anyone ever talks about now. The day the fish came. Everyone's got a story."

"But you don't," The Doctor understood.

"Well, you're definitely going to have one now." I pointed to the string the Doctor was holding, which was being tugged at.

"Something's out there?" Kazran worried excitedly. "Are you sure?"

The Doctor stood to leave, his ear pressed against the door. "Eyes on the tie. Look at me. I wear it and I don't care. Trust me?"

"Yes," the boy replied rather quickly.

"That's why it's cool."

The Doctor opened the door and left, and it only took me a few seconds to get antsy before staring at Dylan. Sure, Dylan worked in the field, but a big part of working in the field was waiting around for long periods of time-- something I wasn't very used to.

"Oh, come on, Scarlette," Dylan pleaded.

"I have to... stay and take care of him," I said quickly, before also leaving the room.

I shut the door behind me quietly, but the Doctor still heard. "What are you doing?"

"I want to see this."

"You should go back inside with Dylan." He told me sternly.

I defiantly moved to stand right next to him, observing the tiny fish poking at the screwdriver. "Why? You never made me go back anywhere before. And you can't."

"No, it's not like that-- I just don't trust him. You shouldn't have brought him here." He didn't look at me, and kept staring on at the fish.

"I had to. Things are difficult back at 51, okay?"

"And things here aren't? That doesn't mean you have to bring him everywhere with you."

"Wow, seriously? Well you don't have to bring River everywhere with you."

The Doctor turned to face me now. "I don't bring her everywhere with me-- she just shows up! And she's _your_ best friend!"

"I don't even know what that means! I don't anything about her! I don't even know if she's secretly out to get me or something."

"Really? Because after Meredith trying to kill me and you and disappearing and reappearing and bringing back a man I don't know; and that vision with your regenerations reversed? The same can be said for you!" The Doctor whisper-shouted.

I stared at him blankly now, willing myself not to let any tears fall. I knew that to some degree he cared about me, but I also knew that these feelings had been tugging at him for awhile. He didn't know me or why I was here-- but I didn't either, and I thought that he could see that. I thought that he could trust me the way that I trusted him, but maybe I shouldn't anyway. The look he gave me then didn't have anymore anger in it-- and there was something unspoken in the air-- like he knew that what he said broke me, but he didn't regret it anyway.

I didn't want to think that he only cared for me and kept me around because I was the only other Time Lord left, but maybe that was just the cold hard truth I had to face.

"Hey, what's going on out there?" Dylan called from the closet.

"Nothing." I called back, still staring at the Doctor.

"Is it big?" Kazran asked.

"Nah, just a little one," The Doctor called, spinning back to face the tiny fish, and clearing his throat. "So, little fellow, what do you eat?"

A big grey shark darted in through the window, chomping the little fish and the screwdriver.

"Can I come out?" Kazran asked.

I stumbled back, and began slowly walking towards the closet, as did the Doctor. "No, don't do that!"

I tried not to sound too worried, but it didn't work seeing as how Dylan opened the closet door, and saw what I was worried about. Dylan pulled me in, and the Doctor also rushed in, closing the door against his back.

When Dylan pulled me, I stumbled into him. I was staring into his eyes, but couldn't help but be struck by how similar this was to the first time I was in the TARDIS, when I almost fell out but the Doctor pulled me back in.

But then the Doctor said to Kazran, "I bet I'll get some very interesting readings off my sonic screwdriver when I get it back from the shark in your bedroom," and I was reminded of how similar it _wasn't._

"There's a shark in _my bedroom?_ " Kazran panicked.

"Oh fine, focus on that part!" The Doctor shouted, as the banging against the door got louder and louder.

"I think we should get back from the door," Dylan suggested.

"Me too, actually," The Doctor grabbed little Kazran, shielding him as we all fell back, and the shark's head bursted through the door, chomping over and over, trying to get to us but not being able to fit deep enough into the closet.

"It's going to eat us, it's going to eat us!" Kazran panicked, eyes shut.

"It's not going to eat us!" Dylan stood, threw his fist across the shark's face, and rammed his arm into its mouth.

**888**

"You didn't have to punch it, you know. With the way it was wedged in the door, it's mouth probably would have stayed open." The Doctor commented as he tried fixing his half of the screwdriver that he possessed.

"Yeah, _probably._ The shark's alive, we're alive, and I got part of your screwdriver," Dylan retorted.

"Half a screwdriver? What use is that?" The Doctor slapped the screwdriver against his palm, trying to get it to work. "Bad, big fishy."

"Guys? I think she's dying," the boy sat on the floor, petting the shark. I sat next to him, rubbing his back comfortingly.

The Doctor knelt down by the shark. "Half my screwdriver's still inside, but yeah, I think so. I doubt they can survive long outside the cloud belt. Just quick raiding trips on a..." The Doctor noticed tears in Kazran's eyes, "foggy night..."

Kazran sniffled. "Can't we get it back up there? We were just going to stun it. I didn't want to _kill_ it."

"We probably can't help it without some kind of life support," Dylan added, standing with crossed arms once again.

"You mean like an icebox?" The boy looked up hopefully.

**888**

"Ah, there's fish down here, too," The Doctor noticed, as we walked through one of the many rows of ice boxes that held people in this strange, giant, freezing basement-cave.

"Yeah, but only tiny ones. The house is built on a fog lake, that's how Dad freezes the people. They're all full, but we could borrow one," Kazran stopped by a box that was familiar to him. "Yeah, this one."

Dylan peered into the hole where he could see the face of the person in the box quickly. "No, not this one."

The Doctor then moved to look at it. "Ah, hello again. I think this one's perfectly fine."

"No it's not," Dylan looked to me, as if asking for help, but I just shook my head. I knew he thought taking out someone else instead might save her life, but it also might never let her live it. Even then, she had too big a part in this-- with the singing and falling in love.

"We should get this one, though, cause that's the same one as before... or, later," The Doctor tried explaining.

"That's exactly why we _shouldn't_ get it." Dylan argued.

I rolled my eyes at them and gave Kazran a look, motioning for him to open the box, which he did.

A video began playing on the clear screen of Abigail, the girl in the box, talking about herself and her thankfulness to Kazran's dad. The boys all finally got quiet when the video started playing, just enough for me to hear something.

"What's that noise?" I asked.

"Just my half a screwdriver trying to repair itself. It's signalling the other half." The Doctor stared at his glowing, beeping broken screwdriver.

"The other half's inside the shark." Kazran remembered.

"Oh, great. It's probably going to home in on the screwdriver. Get ready," I pat Kazran on the back.

"For what?"

The newly healthy shark swam out above us, jaw open wide.

"To run!"

We all split up then, and I darted sideways, out of the way of the shark, just trying to get away from it while I waited for it to settle. I only had to run across a few rows before I stood still, hearing a beautiful operatic voice vibrate throughout the cave.

I followed the sound until I saw Abigail there, kneeling on the floor with the shark laying down before her, singing it a lullaby, with the Doctor and Kazran standing just a few feet away.

"...The notes resonate in the ice crystals, causing a delta wave pattern in the fog," The Doctor rambled on, before slapping his neck. "Ow! A fish bit me."

"Shh," I scolded him. "Let the fish like the singing."

"We should put her back in, get someone else," Dylan approached behind me.

"Get someone else? She's already out, what's the point?" The Doctor asked.

"There has to be an empty one around here somewhere, wouldn't that be better?" Dylan suggested.

The Doctor squinted at him. "There aren't any empty ones, but you said to get someone else first. Why do you want to get someone else?"

"Because of the num--"

Dylan almost revealed the secret of how the numbers on Abigail's box read that she only had eight days left to live, so I whispered harshly before he could. "Would you two both please shut up!"

"Sorry," The Doctor whispered.

Dylan cleared his throat and crossed his arms again. "Sorry."

**888**

"It's bigger on the inside," Kazran smiled in awe at the TARDIS interior.

"Just wait, you haven't seen anything yet," I smiled as I set up some of the TARDIS controls I knew about.

"You know how to work this thing?" Dylan asked.

I shrugged as I continued pressing buttons. "Yeah, part of it is coming back to me slowly. Time Lord version of riding a bike, I guess. You can't really forget it."

Dylan nodded slowly, before helping the Doctor, Kazran, and Abigail drag the shark box in.

**888**

Abigail and Kazran were amazed at the fish floating among the clouds, and the TARDIS in general. Dylan was amazed, also, but significantly less so considering he had experience with crazy things before and for some reason had his guard up more than usual.

Abigail stood in her cyrochamber, smiling brightly and practically glowing, looking on at the four of us in adoration. "If you should ever wish to visit again..."

"We will!" I promised.

"What?" The Doctor asked, surprised.

"No, we won't," Dylan added.

"Sure we will, right Kazran?" I nudged his arm.

Kazran nodded rapidly, grinning. "Yeah, they come every Christmas Eve!"

"No, we don't," The Doctor looked back and forth to us both, confused.

"Yup, we do. Every time. Promise!" I closed the door to the chamber before anyone could add anything else, and turned to Kazran. "Run to your room right now, and meet us here at this exact time next year."

Kazran nodded, and immediately sprint away.

"Scarlette, why would you do that?" Dylan asked.

I stormed off into the TARDIS, the Doctor and Dylan following. "One night won't change everything, no matter how long or intense or impossible. It just won't. It's just not enough."

I was done with Dylan trying to interfere in impossible ways to fix something that couldn't be fixed, and I was done with letting myself have any sort of hope or trust in the Doctor when he didn't have any in me-- even after the one night of the Big Bang. That one intense, impossible night that didn't change anything.

I fiddled around with the controls of the TARDIS, figuring that if I kept moving and had a goal in sight, I wouldn't have time to cry. After all, I didn't even know if I could blame the Doctor for not trusting me.

"Nova, what are you doing?" The Doctor asked carefully, not even bothering to stop me as the TARDIS moved somewhere, and then landed.

I took a deep breath, and for a moment wondered if the fact that the Doctor let me move and land the TARDIS was a sign of trust, before reminding myself that his previous regeneration would have done anything to keep the Master around, who was surely an evil Time Lord.

The Doctor didn't trust me, he just didn't want to let another Time Lord go, no matter how possibly fake or evil.

I stormed out of the TARDIS doors again, landing us in the same exact place one year later, with a slightly taller little Kazran waiting in front of Abigail's box. "Open it, Kazran!"

The box opened, and Kazran and I smiled brightly at Abigail, who smiled brightly right back. "Merry Christmas!"

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do you blame the Doctor for not (completely) trusting Nova?


	40. A Christmas Carol (pt 3)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact-- when i won prom court and was standing on the stage with the other guy who won-- i told him-, "do these people who voted for me know that i write doctor who fan fiction in my free time?" lol

Every year, or rather, few hours or so, The Doctor, Dylan, and I returned to Abigail's cyrochamber with a new idea of something to do. My anger turned into an adrenaline that lasted a surprisingly long time, and I was up for anything for awhile, much to the obvious worry of both the Doctor and Dylan. But I didn't care for either of their worry anymore-- only that everything stayed on track.

"Well, you know the drill-- any Christmas Eve, we have them all." I reminded Abigail, and Kazran, who was now a poster-boy looking teenager.

"Might I make a request?" Abigail inquired softly, fidgeting by the TARDIS console.

"Sure," the Doctor responded curiously.

"This one."

**888**

"So, we'll see you next year?" I asked Kazran, knowing that we wouldn't.

"Listen, why don't we just leave it?" Kazran asked.

The Doctor didn't understand. "Sorry, leave what?"

"Oh, you know, this. Every Christmas Eve. It's getting a bit old."

"Old?" The Doctor asked, disappointed.

"Well, Christmas is for kids, isn't it? I've got some work with my dad now. I'm going to focus on that. Get that cloud belt under control." Kazran attempted to play nonchalant.

Even though I knew what was happening, I couldn't help but feel slightly offended. "Well, sorry."

"Not your fault. Times change."

"Not as much as I'd hoped," the Doctor looked to me for a second, before reaching out to give Kazran his broken screwdriver. "Kazran. I'll be needing a new one anyway, what the hell. Merry Christmas. And if you ever need us, just activate it. We'll hear you."

"I won't need you."

I had taken the time to internally make myself understand what he was going through, and that I would see him in just a few minutes again, but the Doctor looked heartbroken at those words. "What's happened? What are you not telling us? What about Abigail?"

Kazran already began walking away. "I know where to find her."

**888**

I stood a row over in the cave-basement by a random icebox, huddled with the Doctor and Dylan. Amy was being hologram-projected from the ship in order to act as The Ghost of Christmas Present to Kazran, who stopped by Abigail's icebox and explained what happened that last fateful night.

"This is what Nova and the Doctor did to me. Dylan never wanted to take out Abigail. Abigail was ill when she went into the ice, on the point of death. I suppose the rest in the ice helped her. But she's used up her time. All those Christmas Eves with me... I could release her any time I want, and she would live a single day. So tell me, Ghost of Christmas Present, how do I choose which day?"

"I'm sorry. I really am. I'm very, very sorry. But you know what? She's got more time left than I have. More than anyone on this ship," Amy retorted, as Rory widened the beam, and Kazran was projected onto the ship to see all the people he was going to let die.

"There's only one ghost left," I reminded the Doctor.

He nodded and walked to the TARDIS. "You both wait here, I'll get him really quick."

"Get who?" Dylan asked, after the Doctor left.

"Young Kazran. Did you not watch the episode?" I asked.

"Yeah, but I sort of watched them all at once after you told me, the night that you told me... so I don't remember it all that well." Dylan looked to the ground, embarrassed. "But I mean, I'm not that bad, I remember some parts perfectly."

"Really?" I giggled at the idea of Dylan immediately rushing to watch two seasons worth of episodes, and was about to continue when the Doctor returned, a few aisles over.

"I'm sorry. I didn't realize," he apologized to Kazran.

I grabbed Dylan's hand as I maneuvered through the boxes row by row until I got to the row where the Doctor was on the other side, just behind Kazran. "We're sorry too."

Kazran turned, and against the boxes to face all of us. "All my life, I've been called heartless. My other life, my real life, the one you rewrote. Now look at me!"

"Better to have a broken heart than no heart at all," Dylan turned to me. I knew he was repeating an exact line from the show-- one that the Doctor was supposed to say in order to prove to me that he _did_ remember some parts-- but I had a feeling that wasn't the only reason he said it.

"Oh, you try it." Kazran spat.

"I am," Dylan retorted.

Kazran stayed silent for a moment, looking around at us all as if he just now understood our relationship dynamics, before grunting again. "Why are you even here!"

"Because we're not finished with you yet. You've seen the past, the present, and now you need to see the future." The Doctor explained.

"Fine. Do it. Show me. I'll die cold, alone and afraid. Of course I will-- we all do. What difference does showing me make? Do you know why I'm going to let those people die? It's not a plan. I don't get anything from it. It's just that I don't care," Kazran slowly approached the Doctor, until they were just centimeters away from each other. Kazran spat in his face defiantly, but the Doctor stood strong as he continued. "I'm not like you. I don't even want to be like you. I don't and never, _ever_ will care."

"And I don't believe that."

"Then show me the future. Prove me wrong." Kazran challenged.

"I am showing it to you. I'm showing it to you right now," The Doctor turned to me, signaling me to do it.

"Come on out, Kazran," I called, loudly but also as gently as I could.

The older Kazran turned around slowly to face the much younger version of himself-- eight years old and in pajamas, approaching hesitantly. "Dad?"

That one word sent older Kazran over the edge, filling him with rage and making him raise his hand, ready to slap the boy-- until he realized he was standing by Abigail's box, and his memories of her brought him back.

Kazran broke down, his form almost appearing to shrink as he hunched over and folded into himself, crying and slowly stretching his arms out to hug his younger self. "I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry. It's okay, don't be frightened..."

Dylan looked to me and saw that while my eyes were beginning to fill with tears, they were still anxious, so he didn't waste time. "We need to do this now."

**888**

"The controls, they won't respond!" Older Kazran fiddled with the machine, with no results.

"That's because you've changed too much," Dylan admitted quickly, ignoring the look I sent this way.

"Oh, of course! Stupid, stupid Doctor. The machine doesn't recognize you anymore." The Doctor kept pushing at buttons, trying to get the machine to work, but to no avail.

"But my father programmed it," Kazran tried.

"Yeah, to your old self, not your new one." I explained

"Then what do we do?" Kazran worried.

The Doctor mumbled on about how he didn't know, and Dylan only fumbled with himself for a little bit before spitting out-- "Do you still have the Doctor's screwdriver?"

"Yes!" Kazran pulled the part of the screwdriver out of his pocket. "This, you can use this. I kept it, see?"

The Doctor walked away, frustrated. "What, half a screwdriver?" He spoke angrily, before turning back slowly, struck with an idea. "...With the other half up in the sky in a big old shark, right in the heart of the cloud layer. If we use your aerial to boost the signal, set up a resonation pattern between the two halves. Ooh, come on, that would work!" The Doctor rushed back to the machine, taking the screwdriver. "My screwdriver, coolest bit of kit on this planet. Coolest two bits. It could do it."

"Do what?" Kazran asked.

"We could send a signal up there." Dylan stated matter-of-factly, before seeing the look on my face and correcting himself, as though he wasn't sure. "Right?"

"Yes... we need to send something else."

"Send what?" young Kazran asked.

"Well..." The Doctor trailed.

Dylan looked at me, as if saying, if you don't do it, I will.

I took a deep breath. The Doctor was still skirting around the idea in an attempt to make it sound better, and Dylan was getting antsy and I was afraid of what he would say, so I did it. "We need her to sing. It's the only thing that we know that works for sure."

**888**

The Doctor hooked up his sonic screwdriver to some wires that went to a million different places in the TARDIS, and Abigail stood, holding the screwdriver like a microphone, singing of a silence going away, and no longer being lonely.

"Well?" older Kazran asked, simultaneously entranced by Abigail and worried for the passengers.

"The clouds are going to unlock now..." I said softly, staring up at the sky, partially because I didn't want to look at the Doctor or Dylan, and partially because I wanted to admire the view.

"What does that mean, unlock? What happens when a cloud unlocks?" older Kazran asked.

The Doctor smiled, grabbing the shoulders of younger Kazran. "Something that hasn't happened in this town for a very long time now."

As Abigail sang, "When you are here, music is all around. When you are near, music is all around. Open your eyes, don't make a sound," snow began to fall gently to the grown, and I forgot about how cold it was, smiling and laughing as the little flurries floated softly.

"Why are you laughing so much?" The Doctor asked, not being able to hide his own smile.

I didn't look down, just kept staring up at the beautiful weather as I explained. "I've lived in Nevada all my life and only visited my family in Puerto Rico. I've never seen snow before."

Despite whatever sadness and confusion in my heart, it only seemed to amplify what felt like the most glorious moment to experience snow for the first time-- on Christmas day, a life-saving chorus in the air.

**888**

"Why are you so afraid to take risks?" Dylan asked me, once we were back in the TARDIS.

"What do you mean? I take risks. I got the orb, didn't I?" I countered.

"I'm not talking about over there. I'm talking about over _here_. We could have changed something, made a good difference. You have so much potential-- the _universe_ has so much potential," Dylan remarked, as he stood off by the railing of the console, not wanting to touch anything.

He seemed so out-of-place there, and I knew that it was because he was. "It doesn't work that way here. We're a disruption in the natural order of the universe--"

"No," Dylan crossed his arms, shaking his head.

"What? Yes we are--"

"No, _you're_ not. You can't be." Dylan continued harshly.

" _Why?_ " I asked, nearly shouting, not knowing how else I could possibly explain to Dylan why he shouldn't try to mess up anything. It was lucky that we were in a situation that was hard to edit this time around, anyway.

"Because you're _from_ here. This where you're supposed to be. You're not a disruption," Dylan said this defeatedly, and I didn't know why.

I never really thought so much of the idea that I was supposed to be here. Even though I never had to, I always felt the need to return to Area 51 because it was such a huge part of my life-- but it wasn't where I was meant to be anymore. I was angry at the truth that no matter how much I felt like I couldn't leave Area 51, I couldn't leave this universe either. This universe was a great part of who I was... no matter how much I wish it wasn't anymore.

"I'm not from here. I _am_ a disruption... which is why I need to go back," Dylan explained this, almost as if he was asking me.

"Okay, but I'm going back with you. I mean, I kind of have to." Even if I didn't want to leave this universe for awhile, I still needed to go with Dylan in order to drop him off.

"Okay," Dylan moved closer to me, gently grabbing my waist to pull me closer to him, before putting my locket over his head.

**888**

"You know, that could almost be mistaken for a real person. The snowman isn't bad, either." Amy chided as she approached the Doctor, who was finishing a small snowman.

"Ah, yes, you two. About time. Why are you dressed like that?" The Doctor asked, noticing that Rory was dressed as a Roman, and Amy was dressed as a policewoman.

"Er, kind of lost our luggage. Kind of crash landed?" Rory tried.

The Doctor was no less confused. "Yeah, but why are you dressed like that at all?"

"Uh, so where's Nova?" Amy asked, changing the subject.

"In the TARDIS. With Dylan. Or maybe she's not, I don't know. I suspect she'll be leaving shortly either way." The Doctor stood by the TARDIS door with Amy, as Rory went inside.

"Are you okay?" Amy asked.

"Of course I'm okay. You?"

"Of course. It'll be their last day together, won't it?" Amy spoke sadly at the thought of Abigail and Kazran.

"Everything has got to end some time, otherwise nothing would ever get started," The Doctor figured quietly.

Rory stuck his head out of the TARDIS doors. "Doctor? Nova's gone, and there's no one else here."

The Doctor sighed. "Yeah, I figured."

Amy and Rory looked to each other, noticing something was off.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those of you who think Nova never having seen snow is crazy-- I grew up in Texas and only go to visit family in Mexico, so I didn't see snow until I was 13 because I took a trip just to see it. And my little cousins, and my uncles, who were in their 40s, had never seen snow before either! but ANYWAY
> 
> The next book in this series will be called Supernova: Gravity. It's based off the Sara Barellies song also called Gravity, and possibly something else. It should be out sometime next week, maybe even sooner, and it's going to be way better than this one, if I'm being honest. In this book I had to spend a lot of time setting up Nova's character & relationship to the Doctor/River/Amy/Rory/Area 51 and Dylan, so in the next book things will move a whole lot faster (i hope).
> 
> Thank you so much from the bottom of my heart to everyone who read this book. I know it's just a fan fiction but it was very fun writing it and it means a lot that people actually read it and enjoyed it. It took me two years to write because after the Time of Angels chapters, I had the rest of the book written out on my computer, which then crashed, so I lost it all and had to re-write it all. However, re-writing it gave me better ideas than before. I also went through a lot of personal things-- first dates and theater roles and boyfriends and deaths in the family and graduating high school, but I wrote it all anyway.
> 
> As of today, june 16, 2017, I have edited most of this book except these last few chapters. It's also edited on wattpad. this book was originally posted on fan fiction dot net, however it is not completed there and it is EXTREMELY un-editied, so i wouldn't recommend reading it there...
> 
> If you have any questions about something that happened in this book, ask it here and I will try to answer it spoiler-free! 
> 
>  
> 
> Thank you so much!
> 
>  
> 
> (ps: if you have twitter, follow me at marvelmexicana because i'm pretty much always there)


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